Ciphers in Movies

One movie that utilizes the confusion and pressure of ciphers are the Saw movies. In these movies, the antagonist, Jigsaw, uses codes and ciphers to force some of his prisoners to escape their torture chambers. Another movie that uses stenography and ciphers is National Treasure. In this movie, Nicholas Cage chases after a lost treasure through historical knowledge and his ability to decode hidden messages and clues all over the United States. These are only two examples of the movie industry utilizing the suspense and adventure surrounding ciphers and codes.

Jefferson Disk

The Jefferson disk also know as the Jefferson wheel. This is a cipher system in which wheels or disk are used to rearrange the letters of the alphabet. Each wheel contains the 26 letters of the alphabet around its circumference. Each wheel usually has a different order of the letters around the edge. This scrambling of the letters increases the difficulty to break the cipher. There is a hole in the center of each disk that allows them all to slide onto a center axis. The cipher key is very important for the sender and receiver because it indicates the order in which the disks should be placed on the axis.

Stenography

The method of shorthand is a practice in which symbols are used to represent letters or words. This method is mainly used by courtroom workers to copy the discussions of the courtroom verbatim. Abbreviation methods are alphabet-based and use different abbreviating approaches. Secretaries and journalists are also known to be trained in this efficient technique because of their jobs. Though not usually used for secret writing, this technique could easily be used for it as well.

Red Robin Cipher

On Sunday I was at Red Robin with my parents and when I got the my drink I was stunned to see that it was a cipher disk. I was actually pathetically excited to see this and then explained to my parents what it was based off. I then explained how I the inner disk would usually be rotate-able. I do not think that they cared that much but I was very excited and I wanted to show the class how the real world enjoys our material as well.

Caesar Cipher

Julius Caesar, like many other rulers throughout history, was a firm believer in the power and secrecy of cryptology. Caesar was an advocate of different ciphers in order to hide his messages. One cipher that he used the most came to be known at the "Caesar Cipher." This cipher was a simple substitution. Caesar took a regular alphabet and shifted his cipher alphabet 3 letters down. In the Casesar cipher, an A would be written down as a D, a B would be E, and so on. Caesar used this cipher to communicate with his generals. For many years this cipher was not broken, which I find very surprising because compared to other ciphers, this one seems like one of the easiest ones to decipher. If you want to check out more Caesar cipher info or create your own cipher, go to
http://www.simonsingh.net/The_Black_Chamber/caesar.html

Pig Latin: A Childish Form of Codes

At one point in our life, many perhaps all of us have either attempted to or successfully spoken in pig latin. If you were aware of the rules of this code, one would be able to have a coherent conversation with the person speaking but if you did not know the words, the conversation would sound like a bunch of gibberish. They rules of pig latin are :

1. If a word starts with a constant and a vowel, put the last letter of the word at the beginning of the word and add "ay."
Example: Happy = Yhappy + ay = Yhappay

2. If a word starts with two constants move the two constants to the end of the word and add "ay."
Example: Child = Ildch + ay = Ildchay

3. If a word starts with a vowel add the word "way" at the end of the word.
Example: Awesome = Awesome +way = Awesomeway

If you feel like it, try an write a few sentences in accordance with these rules. Oodgay ucklay!

Rules from: http://library.thinkquest.org/27158/concept1_14.html

Free Mason Pig Pen Cipher

One very famous society that is often associated with secrets and ciphers is the group of the Freemasons. The Freemasons are simply members of a fraternal organization. This group though has been known to use symbols and ciphers in communicating with one another, thus adding their reputation as very secret society. One of the ciphers used by the Freemasons was the pig-pen cipher. This cipher was a simple substitution cipher where symbols are substituted for words. Here is a picture of the Freemasons key from Wikipedia:

Alberti Cipher Message

In a world where mono-alphabetic ciphers were losing their secrecy, the quest to give the cryptologists the upper hand against their cryptanalysist rivals had begun. One of the first attempts at enhancing the secrecy was to use poly-alphabetic ciphers, but how? Leon Battista Alberti in his treatise De Cifris was one of the first to attempt this daring task. He invented a simple but very effective tool. This device would later be known as the Alberti Cipher Disk. It consisted of two disks connected by a pin in the center of both. The outer disk consists of capital letters and the inner disk is made up of lower case letters. To begin a cipher or to crack it, the Index letter has to be known. The index letter is chosen from the capital letters and once agreed upon, the first lowercase letter is to be lined up underneath the capital index letter. So if the index letter was D and the first lowercase letter was an "n", the lowercase n would be placed underneath the capital D on the cipher disks. If a lowercase letter was coded for a number between 1-4, that lowercase letter would now be placed underneath the index letter. Also, some letters can code for the deletion of the previous letter uncoded or they could code for nothing at all. All of this is decided beforehand between the sender and the receiver. Here is my humble attempt at this complex cipher:

Index:R

nrbbpxnyrbetgyhdbyydkflleykny.