ABOUT FACTS NET Weapons

 

Secret codes, or encryptions, may not be considered weapons by many people, but in certain cases they can be the most powerful of weapons. When I used to write computer programs as a hobby, I decided to write a software program to encode messages. This was before the time of other famous programs such as Pretty Good Privacy the famous encryption software. I was very proud of myself because in a couple of days I had developed a program that used a key to decrypt the message. Without the key there was no way it could be figured out. The program worked this way. The random number generator in the Amiga (yes I used an Amiga Computer) would decide which numbers to attach to a letter. For example an 'e' might be 3 one time and 56 the next. You could set the software to use as long a list of numbers as you wanted. You could even use up to 10,000 numbers. All you had to do was send the key, which was a number list that was fed into the program, to the person with the message. With this, he or she could restore the message. A couple of weeks later I found out that my great invention was actually a code that was used in World War I, I had reinvented it without realizing it. The next thing I found out was the government didn't like private citizens using codes at the time and when PGP(Pretty Good Privacy) came along they were in court, off and on for years. This made me shelve my program and when I finally decided the Amiga was too old to be of any use anymore, I got rid of everything. I thought I kept the code program but when I went to look for it, it was gone.

Many people through out history were worried about their messages being intercepted and read. They were not always worried about this in time of war but were always scared that political enemies might get to their messages. There could be something in a message from a president that perhaps could lead to a scandal if intercepted. President Jefferson was extremely worried about this and developed a code for his important messages. He taught Lewis, of Lewis and Clark fame how to use his decryption system and when he would send messages to him, Lewis would decrypt them.

Many people today believe that our privacy is almost gone. They have good cause to believe this. Look at the record, anything you put on the internet, anywhere you go on it and anything you save on your computer can be seen. It doesn't stop there, all your telephone conversations can be heard, you can be bugged with tiny devices and even if you are not bugged, you can be eavesdropped upon using new technology, from outside your house or building. I think we have more than enough reason to fear the loss of privacy. Because of this some people are using coded messages in their email. I am not talking about spies but ordinary people that just don't want their emails read. Taking this a step further, a system is in use where an ordinary looking photograph can contain data. This is a little more James Bondish.

The great genius Leonardo DaVinci had things that he didn't want read. In his time not many people could read so he had a step up on codes. What DaVinci did was write his messages backwards so that they could only be read in a mirror. I am afraid that this wouldn't do much good today, but in his time it must have seemed unbreakable, after all, how many people had mirrors?

One of the most successful codes in history was employed by the US Army In World War II, it was the famous Navajo Code. The Navajo language was selected to use for a code because it was an unwritten language and outside of the Navajo Nation it was almost completely unknown. Native Navajos were selected and trained. They were taught things like using the Navajo word for turtle was to mean tank, etc. Even a Navajo hearing their communication wouldn't know what they were talking about. They were called code talkers.

The Japanese had their own secret code and they were very secure in the knowledge that it was unbreakable. But it wasn't and we broke it early on in the war. At times we had to do things like commit ships when we knew an ambush lay ahead but we couldn't let the Japanese know that the code was broken. This breaking of the Japanese code contributed heavily to the winning of the war with Japan. But the Japanese weren't alone in losing their code, the Germans were in the same predicament. A German cipher machine called Enigma had been captured but the Germans didn't know it because the submarine it was on was then sunk. They thought the machine went down with the sub.

A very simple, but effective, code has been around for hundreds of years. It works this way, you use a book as the base for the code. Both sides must use the same one. You then record page, paragraph and word by numbers. For example if the word 'THE' is to be used in the message and it is on page 17, paragraph 3, position 102 you would write 17-3-102 to represent it. This code has been used many times and is still as useful as when it was invented.

Here is an interesting thought for you. What if some of the ancient writings that we have found that can't be interpreted are really codes? The difference between a code and writing is that with a code, something is used to represent something else and with writing a symbol is used to either represent a letter or idea. If you thought that something was writing it was really code, you might not ever be able to figure it out.

With the advent of computers, encryption has become a lot more common place. Even compression programs are a form of encryption, after all, you can't read the message until it is uncompressed and if one were to write a special compression program that only one other person had, it would then be an encryption program. Computers code our passwords, encryption guards access to our nuclear weapons and even our very DNA is a code.

Where did the idea of encryption start? In Egypt of course, almost 4,000 years ago. An Architect, in order to hide a pharaoh's treasure, substituted words in the documentation of the location of monuments built for Khnumhotep II. The Assyrians, in 1500 BC, tattooed the heads of slaves with secret messages but had to wait for the hair to grow back to hide them, ouch! A code known as Atbash was used by Hebrew scribes in 600 BC. It was a reverse alphabet substitution. The Romans developed the Caesar Cipher, in 100 BC, which used a shift of letters in their alphabet. You could set the shift. For example a shift on 2 would mean that A would be C. Pope Clement VII commissioned a code in 1379AD. In 1466 AD the first machine was developed for encryption. Francis Bacon introduced 5 bit binary encoding in 1623.

This is certainly not the entire history of encryption, it is just a teaser. Encryption in one form or another has been used in almost every war since the Romans. It will probably be used in every war from now on. Keeping secrets from your enemy is one of the most important things you can do. The future of encryption is extremely bright. With the new Quantum computers on the horizon, encryptions will be safer than ever, at least from the ordinary person and to those without a Quantum computer. In the public sector encryptions will play an important role in protecting sensitive information. Encryption is here to stay.