Another question related to previous, unanswered A SW system constructed with Microsoft CNG can be FIPS 140-2 Level 2 Compliant?
Another alternative is to store the keys in a Smart card permanently attached to our system (a standard server in a rack) using a USB Reader under Windows 2008 R2. So the cryptographic operations can be performed by the Smart card itself or by the Windows CNG module. The question is about performance, as we need to perform the operations repeatedly. The operation is basically performing a 3DES over a provided MD5 hash and we need to perform this operation about 10.000 times a day. This makes sense? Performance required can be achieved using the Smart card.
What way is preferable, performing the 3DES by the Smart card so the keys never go out the Smart card or importing the keys into CNG and perform 3DES by CNG?
Sorry, too much questions, but we are designing the system and want to ensure compliance, performance...