Take the 2-minute tour ×  What is the difference between the
term cipher (a name like RIJNDAEL) and mode of operation (like
ECB)?  Aren't these both terms for the encryption/decryption
technique?  share|improve this question No, Rijndael is a
cryptographic primitive that you can do things with, a mode of
operation is the method of using it. It is like saying that your
block cipher is SUGAR, and the mode of operation is COOKIES or
M&MS –  Richie Frame Oct 18 '13 at 7:00  3 Answers 3  A mode of
operation is an explicit method by which we use a block cipher
(eg AES) to do more than just encrypt one block of data. For
example, it may allow us to encrypt multiple blocks of data (eg
ECB,CBC etc), provide us with some authenticated encryption (eg
GCM) or a method for encrypting disc storage (eg XTS).
Rijndael,DES etc are block ciphers. That means they provide a
method for encrypting a fixed amount of data (in the case of
AES, they encrypt blocks on 128 bits).  In practice, the amount
of data you want to encrypt is