Robust and fast checksum algorithm?

Question

Which checksum algorithm can you recommend in the following use case?

I want to generate checksums of small JPEG files (~8 kB each) to check if the content changed.

Answer 1

Just a postscript to the above; jpegs use lossy compression and the extent of the compression may depend upon the program used to create the jpeg, the colour pallette and/or bit-depth on the system, display gamma, graphics card and user-set compression levels/colour settings. Therefore, comparing jpegs built on different computers/platforms or using different software will be very difficult at the byte level.