Unsolved Codes and Ciphers

For my project, one of the translators of the codes was Elonka Dunin. She has a long list of accomplishments that pertain to cryptology. One of the most interesting things that I find about her is her list of famous unsolved codes and ciphers. It is interesting to compare and contrast the codes and see if there are any similarities between them. My cipher is related to one of the most famous unsolved ciphers that is "Kryptos." Part of my code is incorporated with this code. If anyone has a chance, you should check out this cite. It is REALLY cool to read the descriptions of the codes. I promise they aren't hard codes to read about, and there is extra information on the codes if you would like it.

Here is the link:
http://elonka.com/UnsolvedCodes.html

Steganography

This isn't relevant to my post at all, but I typed in cryptology to the google search bar and one of the blogs from our class popped up. So anyone who is in the least bit curious about cryptology learns something from someone in our class. EPIC.

We talk a lot in our class about cryptology, but I was more curious about steganography. I posted a while ago about the definition but this new website I found has more information. There are two different parts of this website that is the "Guide to Steganography." I think it is really cool so I hope someone checks this out!

Part 1: http://www.businessinsider.com/a-guide-to-steganography-part-1-how-to-hide-secret-messages-in-images-2011-10

Part 2: http://www.businessinsider.com/a-guide-to-steganography-part-2-how-to-hide-files-and-archives-in-text-files-2011-10

Another View

I was looking around on the internet for anything about cryptology. I am not exactly sure how I stumbled upon the website, but the website I found is pretty cool. This website allowed me to hear a second opinion on cryptology. The aspect about "Traditional Cryptology" was very interesting because we have covered a lot of that material. (eg. The Enigma Machine) However, the difference is that this website has a page dedicated to how Quantum Cryptology works. It also has a page that talks about traditional cryptology issues, as well as how to use quantum cryptology. The articles are fairly short so everyone should check it out!

http://science.howstuffworks.com/science-vs-myth/everyday-myths/quantum-cryptology.htm

Cyrillic Project Code

I am doing the Cyrillic Projector Code as my code for my project. This is a code that is located in Langley, Virginia at the CIA headquarters. I personally think that this code is amazing, because it is art as well. At night a light shines through the artwork which projects an incredibly beautiful sight. This code is intricate. A very interesting part of this code is that it has four parts. Three of the parts have been deciphered, however, one has not. The one that has not been cracked is Kryptos. I believe that the artist is talented in many different aspects because he not only has beautiful artwork, but he created a challenging code to crack. Jim Sanborn, the artist, is a jack of all trades.

Wall Street

Everyone has heard about the Occupy Wall Street, I think that is too controversial of an issue to comment on. However, Wall Street does relate to cryptology. Think about algorithms. That is one aspect that absolutely fuels Wall Street. Long equations are used instead of the simplistic poly alphabetic substitutions. Of course algorithms are used for ATM's, but particularly online algorithms are used. The encryption process for online websites to make sure your information is secure is simply algorithms. This is the immediate connection between Wall Street and cryptology!

Copiale Cipher

I just came upon a video about the Copiale Cipher. This video includes how they initially thought the text would be decoded, how they were mistaken, how the text was actually deciphered among other things. They discuss what the text says. There were 75,000 characters used in this 105 page book written completely in code. The oddest part about this is that the book is written by eye enthusiasts. It is such an odd field to write in code about, but it is truly the method of decryption and encryption that makes the Copiale Cipher so intriguing.

Click on the link that pops up when you click the words below!
Copiale Cipher

Encryption

There are many methods that contain codes and pertain to computers.  However, I started thinking about hacking computers and how that requires codes.  Think about it, what happens when your computer is hacked?  Well for me, I would have opened an encrypted file or encrypted website.  All of these issues occur from encryption and these issues then all originate from cryptology.  It is interesting to see how many ways cryptology affects our lives.

Can you put a number to how many codes there are in the World?

I was sitting in class, and stated thinking about how may endless possibilities of codes there are. I pondered how many codes there can be. I wanted to find a number for how many codes exist or existed in our society, but that simply isn't possible. I could even come up with a code right now and that would effect the number. I suppose you could classify codes. This would result in saying there are two kinds of codes: Cryptology and Steganography. In many ways you could say that, however, then there are contradictory thoughts. Such as there are subcategories to each of these kinds of codes, and do those count? In the world today you can put a number on almost anything. How many people are there in the world? How much food do we waste? So on and so forth. But isn't it odd when you can't put a number on everything in the world? I kind of love it.

Do you accept?

After reading another post about internet security, I thought more about how relaxed our generation is when using the internet. How many times have you just ignored the "Warnings:..." with a very long list of items in small print. Or how many times to you hit "I Accept these terms and Agreements" without reading one word of the 28 pg. agreement your accepting? I know I do it all the time, and it is terrible. I realized that by hitting agree we accept anything they say. They could say you are now agreeing to let us use any pictures of yours for our billboards, and we accept this! I know everyone says that this is terrible and yet no one changes their behavior, but I figured I would post about it anyways and maybe one person would read at least a paragraph of the "I accept" terms next time to comprehend what exactly they are agreeing to.

Evolution

The world has evolved in millions of ways over the centuries. One of these ways is how cryptologists create codes and how cryptanalysts break them. Within The Code Book, we hear a lot about the on paper work that goes on in previous times to break codes. For example, we know that the frequency analysis took long hours and many records of how many times any given letter occurred. The difference between this way of cracking codes and what is used today is extremely large. Now a days codes are so complex that they are solely through computers. As codes progress they seem to be getting more and more complex and technologically reliant. I am curious as to what will come next. I am also curious to find out exactly how we encrypt things today, because there is no doubt in my mind that the government will move onto another method soon and then we will hear about the methods that are being used at this exact moment.

What can we create that will progress our entire society and be used to keep top secret information hidden? I suppose this will be left up to the masterminds of our world today, and the rest of us will find out in 50 years when they no longer use the method. It never stops amazing me how much we dont know about our government and what systems they use.

Steganography

In this class we talk a great deal about cryptologists and cryptanalysts, however, we have not talked about steganography that recently. Steganography is hiding the existence of a message. This comes from the two words "steganos"and "graphein." These two words mean covered and to write. While keeping this in mind I decided to find out more about steganography. I set out thinking that I would find examples of steganography in the past, instead I found steganography used today. I had no idea that you could download software, find tips, and tools to help you hide files among other things. It was a naive thought to believe that steganography is not used that much, but I am still amazed that it is possible to download information and software off of the website to help with these kinds of things. There was no specific website or software I looked at in particular, but they all seem to have the same goal. So if you are reading this blog and like to hide your files on your computer ( I can't because iI am technologically challenged) you should check out more about this topic!

Yes, I am a loser.

So, I know that it is a Friday night and that I absolutely have better things to be doing on a Friday night, but I just stumbled upon what I think is the coolest thing ever. For those of you who read the short story "The Adventure of Dancing Men" you will think this is cool too. If you go to this website you can create your own dancing men codes. You just type in the plain text and it shows you what the message would look like. It includes the men with flags along with the punctuation dancing men. I seriously encourage everyone to look at this site.

http://www.purplehell.com/riddletools/danceman.htm



P.S. Not only is this awesome but since I found it so early I will finish my blogging early for next week!
       (yes I am a loser)

Anyone looking for a job?

I know that most of these jobs are positions that require a PhD or something along those lines but I thought that this was very interesting. This website has many listings of jobs pertaining to cryptology. Not only are these job offers but they are around the world. These different jobs could be research as well as working with other cryptologists or cryptanalysts. I put the link below just incase other people wanted to check out the website and see what their futures could hold.

http://www.iacr.org/jobs/

Cryptozoology

Did you know there is such a thing as cryptozoology? Well there is. It is the study of imaginary creatures. Another definition is the study of creatures whose existence has not been sustained. I stumbled upon cryptozoology when I was searching about cryptology. Once I saw the definition for cryptozoology I thought that I had to at least comment on it. Its intriguing to me that cryptology can have such a different meaning than cryptology. When I first think of cryptology I think of secret messages in codes. To compare that with creature that don’t necessarily exist is a funny concept for me. I never even knew cryptozoology existed. 

Cryptology Right Around the Corner

I was researching about cryptology online and I came upon a website that I thought was pretty cool. This website is for the National Cryptologic Museum. It only opened to the public in 1993 and has a vast majority of resources. It supports the National Security Agency and the Center Security Service. I attached the link below so you can check it out if you want. Let me know what you think! 

P.S. Professor Koss if you read this, it's only 2 hours away. We could take a field trip!

http://www.nsa.gov/index.shtml

Simplistic Codes

So today I read a post about how everyone speaks and writes in code everyday whether or not they know it and i started thinking about which ways we do that. When I was thinking about this I remembered an old code my best friend and I used to write secret notes to each other. I thought why not share it with everyone else. Below is the key, if anybody reads this try to encode a message using this key. You draw out each section of the grid you would like to use. Then if its the first letter you don't put any dot s. If it is the second letter, you put one dot in that grid section. If its the third letter, you put two dots.

abc	def	ghi
jkl	mno	pqr
stu	vwx	yz

When using this code you have to use the grid as well as the letters. To encrypt the letter r you would draw this:

. .

Cryptology Around Us

So I was curious as to how much cryptology was actually around this campus, so I looked up a few numbers. First, there are 13 book in our library at this very moment that pertain to cryptology. There are also 2 journals that are available when you search cryptology in journals. Within those journals there are thousands of articles. I thought this was interesting because even though these are only a few figures it helps to remind us that cryptology is everywhere. These numbers also don't include the numerous novels among other works of literature that touch on cryptology. If the catalog search included books that had any mention of cryptology, I am positive that the list would be long and overwhelming. Just thought this was an interesting aspect of cryptology that surrounds us.

The Unbreakable Code

After reading in The Code Book that there is in fact a breakable code but people don't use it, I started to think about  other unbreakable codes. In The Code Book, they do not use this code because the manufacturing and distributing would be difficult. However, I found a short article about Hyper-Encryption. I have attached the link to the article I found if anyone wants to read about a very short article about this code. Hope you enjoy!

http://www.cio.com/article/30849/Cryptologists_Continue_The_Quest_for_an_Unbreakable_Code

Definitions

Within class we constantly talk about cryptology and the different aspects of cryptology, however, this evening I became curious as to how others define such a complex topic. Here are just a few of the definitions that I came across:

The scientific study of cryptography and cryptanalysis.
The study of codes. The art of writing and solving them.
The study of mathematics, linguistics, and other coding patterns and histories.
The science or study of the techniques of secret writing, especially code or cipher systems, or the like.
The procedures, processes, methods, etc., of making and using secret writing, as codes or ciphers.

I thought it was interesting to hear others views of this definition, because to me cryptology can be anything pertaining to secrecy. All of the definitions seem to only focus on codes, where I believe these should incorporate the ideals of cryptology in the modern world. Simple examples such as ATM's, internet encryptions, among many others should be at least touched upon in these decisions.

Websites Definitions:
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/cryptology
http://www.definition-of.net/cryptology
http://www.allwords.com/word-cryptology.html

Cryptology in the World Today

Cryptology can be used in many different forms within the world today. Whether it is being used in an ATM, for the FBI, or a certain individual calling out for help, it is becoming increasingly useful. As the world progresses, these uses are becoming more and more diverse. However, today I chose to think about all the aspects that go into cryptology. Not only do those intertwined with this study have to be incredibly smart, but they also have to be discrete. When thinking about receiving messages and sending those involved must be sneaky. However, those who are attempting to intercept and decode messages must be even more sly when attempting these tasks. Mary Queen of Scotts is the perfect example of this. The spy's have to copy the messages and then reseal the messages so that their efforts go undetected. Another example of this is referenced in The Code Book. The black chambers have to tediously open, copy, and reseal an obscene amount of letters and decode them all. This all must happen without either the sender or the receiver of the message finding out. The two aspects I touched upon earlier are just a small portion of the overwhelming large number of talents that must be acquired before attempting such an intense occupation. In my eyes, I would never be up to par on such an array of talents to complete this job successfully. So I finish by thanking all those who are talented enough and work hard enough to decode those messages that protect our country and our well-being.

Cryptology Around the World

I recently read an article that expresses the intentions of a number of universities in London, as well as other universities in that area to further research in the area of cryptology. The University College of London, University of St. Andrews, Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, and London's City University will all be working together to explore how cryptology is used today. I found it intriguing that cryptology can be intertwined with the use of ATM's, garage doors, and conveying secret government messages. However, it can also be used for cyber crimes as well as terrorism. I am sure that it would make many cryptologists happy to know that there is still an interest in cryptology among young people in the world today. I am curious to what specifically these universities will discover and can't wait to read more about it!

The Cipher Disk

Within The Code Book, by Simon Singh, the concepts of polyalphabectic substitution ciphers are described. The opportunities that this cipher created for cryptographers were incredible. These ciphers were  safe from cryptanalysis and cryptanalysts for the time being, however, it was still a hassle to use such a complex method of substitution. The cipher disk created ease for those using this particular kind of substitution in a cipher. Below is a quotation from a movie that can be deciphered using the cipher disk. This is a quote from my favorite movie, so I hope you enjoy this activity. 

Hint: There are letters on the cipher disk that can take the identity of more than one letter if that letter does not appear on the outer disk. 

Index: M

gxlzrdcceeckagdsfsnyyf