I have received a question asking for How I can compute a SHA1 hash.

You can use this function or similar to get 160bit hash.

Imports System.Security.Cryptography

    ' Computing Hash for SHA1
    Function SHA1(ByVal dataStream As String) As Byte()
        Dim Ascii As New ASCIIEncoding
        Dim tmpsource(dataStream.Length) As Byte
        tmpsource = Ascii.GetBytes(dataStream)
        Dim sha As New SHA1CryptoServiceProvider()
        Return sha.ComputeHash(tmpsource)
    End Function

PepLluis,