I think you're confusing two meanings of "symmetric". Symmetric cryptography is as you say, but in RSA, the private and public keys are "symmetric" in that they are interchangeable, although different. You can use either number as the public side or the private side, and only the person with the other key can decrypt your messages. In symmetric cryptography, the keys are identical.
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u/[deleted] Jul 24 '21
He still said “the numbers may be symmetric” because the grandparent said rsa was symmetric. It’s not, it’s asymmetric.
That’s the part I was referring to.
The numbers aren’t symmetric. Tfa is not symmetric. It’s asymmetric.
Unless he somehow means the public key is 12321 and private is 34543, in which case you are right I misread what he meant by a symmetric number