Users report that after downloading several applications, their systems' performance has noticeably decreased. Which of the following would be used to validate programs prior to installing them?

Whole disk encryption protects data stored on a drive from unauthorized access but does not provide any mechanism to validate whether a program has been tampered with before installation.

SSH (Secure Shell) is a protocol for encrypted remote access and secure file transfer and is not used to verify the integrity of software packages prior to installation.

Telnet is an unencrypted remote access protocol that provides no security features and cannot be used to validate the integrity of files or applications.

MD5 is a hashing algorithm that produces a fixed-length digest (checksum) of a file. Before installing an application, a user or system can compute the MD5 hash of the downloaded file and compare it to the hash provided by the trusted source. If the hashes match, the file has not been altered and is safe to install; a mismatch signals that the file may contain malware or was corrupted.