Public-key cryptography, or asymmetric cryptography, is the field of cryptographic systems that use pairs of related keys. Each key pair consists of a public key and a corresponding private key. Key pairs are generated with algorithms based on mathematical problems termed one-way functions. Security of public-key cryptography depends on keeping the private key secret; the public key can be openly distributed without compromising security.

There are many kinds of public-key cryptosystems, with different security goals, including digital signature, Diffie–Hellman key exchange, public-key key encapsulation, and public-key encryption.

Public key algorithms are fundamental security primitives in modern cryptosystems, including applications and protocols that offer assurance of the confidentiality and authenticity of electronic communications and data storage. They underpin numerous Internet standards, such as Transport Layer Security (TLS), SSH, S/MIME, and PGP. Compared to symmetric cryptography, public-key cryptography can be too slow for many purposes, so these protocols often combine symmetric cryptography with public-key cryptography in hybrid cryptosystems.

Before the mid-1970s, all cipher systems used symmetric key algorithms, in which the same cryptographic key is used with the underlying algorithm by both the sender and the recipient, who must both keep the key secret. Of necessity, the key in every such system had to be exchanged between the communicating parties in some secure way prior to any use of the system – for instance, via a secure channel.

This requirement is never trivial and very rapidly becomes unmanageable as the number of participants increases, when secure channels are not available, or when (as is sensible cryptographic practice) keys are frequently changed. In particular, if messages are meant to be secure from other users, a separate key is required for each possible pair of users.

By contrast, in a public-key cryptosystem, the public keys can be disseminated widely and openly, and only the corresponding private keys need be kept secret.

For example, a software publisher can create a signature key pair and include the public key in software installed on computers. Later, the publisher can distribute an update to the software signed using the private key, and any computer receiving an update can confirm it is genuine by verifying the signature using the public key. As long as the software publisher keeps the private key secret, even if a forger can distribute malicious updates to computers, they cannot convince the computers that any malicious updates are genuine.

Because asymmetric key algorithms are nearly always much more computationally intensive than symmetric ones, it is common to use a public/private asymmetric key-exchange algorithm to encrypt and exchange a symmetric key, which is then used by symmetric-key cryptography to transmit data using the now-shared symmetric key. PGP, SSH, and the SSL/TLS family of schemes use this procedure; they are thus called hybrid cryptosystems.

The initial asymmetric cryptography-based key exchange to share a server-generated symmetric key from the server to client has the advantage of not requiring that a symmetric key be pre-shared manually, such as on printed paper or discs transported by a courier, while providing the higher data throughput of symmetric key cryptography over asymmetric key cryptography for the remainder of the shared connection.

As with all security-related systems, there are various potential weaknesses in public-key cryptography. Aside from poor choice of an asymmetric key algorithm (there are few that are widely regarded as satisfactory) or too short a key length, the chief security risk is that the private key of a pair becomes known. All security of messages, authentication, etc., encrypted with this private key will then be lost.

This is commonly mitigated (such as in recent TLS schemes) by using forward secrecy capable schemes that generate an ephemeral set of keys during the communication, which must also be known for the communication to be compromised.

Additionally, with the advent of quantum computing, many asymmetric key algorithms are considered vulnerable to attacks, and new quantum-resistant schemes are being developed to overcome the problem.

Beyond algorithmic or key-length weaknesses, some studies have noted risks when private key control is delegated to third parties. Research on Uruguay's implementation of Public Key Infrastructure under Law 18.600 found that centralized key custody by trust service providers may weaken the principle of private-key secrecy, increasing exposure to man-in-the-middle attacks and raising concerns about legal non-repudiation.

All public key schemes are in theory susceptible to a "brute-force key search attack". However, such an attack is impractical if the amount of computation needed to succeed – termed the "work factor" by Claude Shannon – is out of reach of all potential attackers. In many cases, the work factor can be increased by simply choosing a longer key. But other algorithms may inherently have much lower work factors, making resistance to a brute-force attack (e.g., from longer keys) irrelevant.

Some special and specific algorithms have been developed to aid in attacking some public key encryption algorithms; both RSA and ElGamal encryption have known attacks that are much faster than the brute-force approach. None of these are sufficiently improved to be actually practical, however.

Major weaknesses have been found for several formerly promising asymmetric key algorithms. The "knapsack packing" algorithm was found to be insecure after the development of a new attack. As with all cryptographic functions, public-key implementations may be vulnerable to side-channel attacks that exploit information leakage to simplify the search for a secret key. These are often independent of the algorithm being used. Research is underway to both discover, and to protect against, new attacks.