CryptDestroyKey
[New
- Windows NT]
[New
- Windows 95, OEM Service Release 2]
The CryptDestroyKey
function releases the handle referenced by the hKey parameter. Once a
key handle has been released, it becomes invalid and cannot be used again.
If the handle
refers to a session key, or to a public key that has been imported into the CSP
through CryptImportKey,
this function destroys the key and frees the memory that the key occupied. Many
CSPs will scrub the memory where the key was held before freeing it.
On the other
hand, if the handle refers to a public/private key pair (obtained from CryptGetUserKey), the underlying key pair
is not destroyed by this function. Only the handle is destroyed.
BOOL
CRYPTFUNC CryptDestroyKey(
|
HCRYPTKEY hKey |
|
|
); |
|
Parameters
hKey
[in] A handle
to the key to be destroyed.
Remarks
Keys take up
memory in both the operating system s memory space and the CSP s memory space.
Some CSPs will be implemented in hardware with very limited memory resources.
For this reason, it is important that applications destroy all keys with the CryptDestroyKey
function when they are finished with them.
Return Values
If the
function succeeds, the return value is nonzero.
If the
function fails, the return value is zero. To retrieve extended error
information, use the GetLastError function.
The following
table lists the error codes most commonly returned by the GetLastError
function. The error codes prefaced by NTE are generated by the particular CSP
you are using.
|
Error |
Description |
|
ERROR_INVALID_HANDLE |
One of the
parameters specifies an invalid handle. |
|
ERROR_INVALID_PARAMETER |
One of the
parameters contains an invalid value. This is most often an illegal pointer. |
|
NTE_BAD_KEY |
The hKey
parameter does not contain a valid handle to a key. |
|
NTE_BAD_UID |
The CSP
context that was specified when the key was created cannot be found. |
Example
See the
Example section in the CryptGenKey function.
See Also