When a file is added to a ZIP file, it can be encrypted. This encryption offers such a file in the ZIP container a degree of protection against unauthorized access. Anyone wishing to read the data in the file must decrypt it again when it is extracted and requires the appropriate key (the crypto password) to do this. The ZIP container itself is not protected by this encryption.
BS2ZIP supports the Zip 2.0 encryption mechanism and is consequently compatible with WinZip and many other Zip tools. Zip 2.0 encryption is relatively weak and does not offer sufficient protection against special password recovery tools.
BS2ZIP encrypts files when they are added to the archive and decrypts them again when they are extracted, provided encryption was enabled using the MODIFY-ZIP-OPTIONS statement. The appropriate crypto password must also be specified when the function is enabled.
If a ZIP container contains files with different passwords, encryption must be specified again with the requisite password before a file is extracted.
When extraction takes place to non-BS2000 systems, WinZip or the Zip tool would have to be restarted for each password in such cases.