All Microsoft platforms provide a default set of CSPs that provide basic cryptographic functions, known as the Base CSPs. The Base CSPs provide services such as encryption using RSA and DES, digital signing using DSA, and secure hashing using MD5 and SHA-1. In general, a hardware accelerator is any piece of hardware that is designed to perform a computation in place of software. As a rule, special-purpose hardware can perform computations much faster than software. In cases where performance is crucial, the cost of dedicated hardware may be worth the improved performance it provides.
Modular exponentiation is a mathematical operation that is at the heart of public-key cryptography.
It consists of raising a number to a power, then taking the modulus of the result with respect to another number. Most public-key cryptoalgorithms involve the use of modular exponentiation. Modular exponentiation is very computationally-intensive operation, and is rather slow when performed in software. As a result, hardware accelerators are frequently used to improve the throughput of machines that perform a high volume of cryptographic processing. It allows a CSP to use a hardware accelerator in order to improve the speed with which modular exponentiation can be performed.