This is actually typical of most identifiers. If a parameter is $null and the identifier does accept $null for that parameter, it returns $null as the result and does not process the identifier. In this case, $null is not allowed for the salt parameter, so the identifier returns $null without doing anything.
In this case, I can change $encode()/$decode() to allow $null for all parameters. This will be in the next beta.
Update: Actually, making that change could be a problem as it could affect backwards compatibility. I will make the above change so that it only applies to the 'ec' encryption switches.
