What is scrypt?

• A. A memory-hard password hashing algorithm
• B. Replacing sensitive data with non-sensitive tokens
• C. Hiding data within another medium
• D. Session keys are not compromised if long-term keys are exposed

Answer: (A)

Scrypt is a memory-hard password hashing algorithm. It takes a password, a salt, and parameters that determine how much memory and CPU time are used to produce a derived key. The memory-hard design means it requires a large amount of RAM to compute, making brute-force attacks with specialized hardware much more expensive and less practical. This property is what makes scrypt suitable for securely hashing and storing passwords, since attackers face a higher resource cost to crack them. The other options describe tokenization, hiding data through steganography, or forward secrecy concepts, which do not define what scrypt is.