Patent ID: 8135132

Claim:
A method for encapsulating and controlling at least one clear key in a secure key block, comprising: generating, by a cryptographic system, an encrypted key field by applying an encryption algorithm to the at least one clear key; appending, by the cryptographic system, a control field to the encrypted key field, wherein the control field contains attributes of the at least one clear key; applying, by the cryptographic system, a hash algorithm across a concatenation of the control field, the encrypted key field, and a first variant of a key-encrypting key to create a hash field that ties the control field to the at least one clear key; and appending, by the cryptographic system, the hash field to the control field and the encrypted key field in the secure key block, wherein tampering with the secure key block is to render the hash field in the secure key block unequal to a computed hash field computed at a device receiving the secure key block, based on a concatenation of the control field, the encrypted key field, and the first variant of the key-encrypting key.