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Okay, not to put anyone off crypto, as it's really really important, but the one rule everyone needs to remember: Use the current best practices for each situation, don't make up your own crypto.

This usually means "use whatever is in OpenSSL, Keyczar, etc", that's what it's for.

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The article makes the point that it is insufficient to use good crypto algorithms / implementations. You must also use it correctly.

"A component can only be secure under certain well-defined circumstances, not for any use that happens to look similar."

A hash is a crypto primitive, it's not what you use for that. If you want to store a password, you use a KDF. If you want to fake-sign, you use an HMAC with a secret. You don't use a hash, just like you don't use plain AES to encrypt a file.

> don't use plain AES to encrypt a file

What does "plain" mean in this context? (If you mean ECB then you are right, but it is ambiguous.)

I mean a mode without authenticated encryption:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Authenticated_encryption

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