What is the process of adding random characters at the beginning or end of a password to generate a completely different hash called?

Salting

Explanation:

Salting is an idea that is related to hashing of password which is the mapping of input data to a fixed length output data by the use of algorithms.

Salting is the addition of a distinctive value to the beginning or end of a password in order to form a different hash value from the hash value that would have been generated without the 'salt', thereby making the passwords more secure from attacks

The salt for each user is a unique value that is stored along with the username in a database

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