Trust-Service for digital information (tsdi)

In Germany the state authorities BSI and Bundesnetzagentur are in charge with safeguarding trustworthy techniques for e-commerce and e-government. For instance digital singnatures are accepted only under the precondition that they are generated with certified signature units. The algorithms which those units use for creating hash-codes must be accepted by the RegTP. RIPEMD160 is such a algorithm. And RIPEMD160 has an additional advantage in comparison to other algorithms: There exists a reference source code of the algorithm in the internet at the home page of one of the inventors, Antoon Bosselaers. That gives everybody who mistrust implementations of RIPEMD160 like “winhash” the opportunity to compare the results of test vectors and to ensure by this the integrity of the implementation. Mr. Bosselaers was so kind to allow PTB to distribute for tsdi the PTB-made windows implementation of his original program. In conjunction with this please keep attention to his hints of authorship and disclaimer:

Conditions for use of the RIPEMD-160 Software

The RIPEMD-160 software is freely available for use under the terms and conditions described hereunder, which shall be deemed to be accepted by any user of the software and applicable on any use of the software:

K.U.Leuven Department of Electrical Engineering- ESAT/COSIC shall for all purposes be considered the owner of the RIPEMD-160 software and of all copyright, trade secret, patent or other intellectual property rights therein.
The RIPEMD-160 software is provided on an "as is" basis without warranty of any sort, express or implied. K.U.Leuven makes no representation that the use of the software will not infringe any patent or proprietary right of third parties. User will indemnify K.U.Leuven and hold K.U.Leuven harmless from any claims or liabilities which may arise as a result of its use of the software. In no circumstances K.U.Leuven R&D will be held liable for any deficiency, fault or other mishappening with regard to the use or performance of the software.
User agrees to give due credit to K.U.Leuven in scientific publications or communications in relation with the use of the RIPEMD-160 software as follows: RIPEMD-160 software written by Antoon Bosselaers, available at:
http://www.esat.kuleuven.ac.be/~cosicart/ps/AB-9601/

On the part of PTB we have to add our own disclaimer:
PTB excludes any liability concerning any kind of damages due to use of the program "winhash.exe"
(Hint: In case of dispute the German text is valid: Haftungsausschlusserklärung: Seitens der PTB wird jede Haftung für ggf. auftretende Schäden aus der Verwendung des hier zur Verfügung gestellten Programmes "Winhash.exe" ausgeschlossen.)

Operating instructions for "winhash"

The winhash program is nothing more than adding windows graphical user interface to the original Bosselaers "hashtest"-program. It does not need any installation procedure. Immediately after download you can start the program by double click. A window with file selection box appears. Proceed as follows:

Select the file which you want to hash. (procedure as known under windows)
winhash provides you with the RIPEMD160-hash-code.
If you like you can copy the code to the clipboard by click on the "copy" button.
If you like you can save the code in a file by click on the "save" button.

Because the hash-codes are rather long winhash provides you with a feature to compare the calculated hash-code with a code from the clipboard. Proceed as follows:

Copy a hash code from somewhere to the clipboard
Put the cursor in the second line in the winhash window
Click the "compare hash-code" button.
winhash will show whether the codes are identical