Why do carrots disappear when coding a string in Base64?

Hi. I am created a Base64 string using two functions I found online

public static string Encode(string plainText) {
var plainTextBytes = System.Text.Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(plainText);
return System.Convert.ToBase64String(plainTextBytes);
}
public static string Decode(string base64EncodedData) {
var base64EncodedBytes = System.Convert.FromBase64String(base64EncodedData);
return System.Text.Encoding.UTF8.GetString(base64EncodedBytes);
}

So I do string encoded = Encode("test^string"); but if I Console.WriteLine the encoded string I see "teststring". How can I encode it and preserve the carrot? I also tried two crypto functions I found online:

public static string EncryptString(string Message, string Passphrase) {
byte[] Results;
System.Text.UTF8Encoding UTF8 = new System.Text.UTF8Encoding();
MD5CryptoServiceProvider HashProvider = new MD5CryptoServiceProvider();
byte[] TDESKey = HashProvider.ComputeHash(UTF8.GetBytes(Passphrase));
TripleDESCryptoServiceProvider TDESAlgorithm = new TripleDESCryptoServiceProvider();
TDESAlgorithm.Key = TDESKey;
TDESAlgorithm.Mode = CipherMode.ECB;
TDESAlgorithm.Padding = PaddingMode.PKCS7;
byte[] DataToEncrypt = UTF8.GetBytes(Message);
try {
ICryptoTransform Encryptor = TDESAlgorithm.CreateEncryptor();
Results = Encryptor.TransformFinalBlock(DataToEncrypt, 0, DataToEncrypt.Length);
} finally {
TDESAlgorithm.Clear();
HashProvider.Clear();
}
return Convert.ToBase64String(Results);
}
public static string DecryptString(string Message, string Passphrase) {
byte[] Results;
System.Text.UTF8Encoding UTF8 = new System.Text.UTF8Encoding();
MD5CryptoServiceProvider HashProvider = new MD5CryptoServiceProvider();
byte[] TDESKey = HashProvider.ComputeHash(UTF8.GetBytes(Passphrase));
TripleDESCryptoServiceProvider TDESAlgorithm = new TripleDESCryptoServiceProvider();
TDESAlgorithm.Key = TDESKey;
TDESAlgorithm.Mode = CipherMode.ECB;
TDESAlgorithm.Padding = PaddingMode.PKCS7;
byte[] DataToDecrypt = Convert.FromBase64String(Message);
try {
ICryptoTransform Decryptor = TDESAlgorithm.CreateDecryptor();
Results = Decryptor.TransformFinalBlock(DataToDecrypt, 0, DataToDecrypt.Length);
} finally {
TDESAlgorithm.Clear();
HashProvider.Clear();
}
return UTF8.GetString(Results);
}

I did string encoded = EncryptString("test^string", "somepassphrase"); then when I output it I get the same "teststring" as the other function. Augh!

5 Replies

Know the answer? Post it — somebody with the same question will find it here.

Suthish Nair10y ago
Close the thread, if its resolved..
Ken10y ago
Thanks again!
Suthish Nair10y ago
Use System.Net.WebUtility.HtmlDecode instead of Decode.
Ken10y ago
.NET 4 Client Profile. Actually, I just found the problem. When you said it worked fine for you, I thought maybe I should try it as basic as possible, not as part of my actual program so in my main function I put Console.WriteLine(Decode(Encode("test^string"))); and it actually outputted it correctly.

After wracking my brain, the only difference I saw was that when it fails in the normal part of my code, it's being passed as a command line argument so I had it echo the input rather than the encoded output and sure enough, it was coming in as teststring.

Once I encapsulated the command line argument with double quotes, the problem was solved. Thanks.
Suthish Nair10y ago
Code working fine for me. Which framework are you using?