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Cryptography Guide

This document provides instructions on different ciphers and codes, including the Caesar cipher, Vigenère cipher, and ADFGX cipher. The Caesar cipher involves shifting each letter by a set number of places in the alphabet. The Vigenère cipher uses a keyword to shift letters by different amounts to encrypt each letter. The ADFGX cipher was developed by Germany for telegraph communication, representing letters with pairs of letters from the ADFGX set and transposing the pairs using a keyword grid.

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HARIS GAMING
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59 views4 pages

Cryptography Guide

This document provides instructions on different ciphers and codes, including the Caesar cipher, Vigenère cipher, and ADFGX cipher. The Caesar cipher involves shifting each letter by a set number of places in the alphabet. The Vigenère cipher uses a keyword to shift letters by different amounts to encrypt each letter. The ADFGX cipher was developed by Germany for telegraph communication, representing letters with pairs of letters from the ADFGX set and transposing the pairs using a keyword grid.

Uploaded by

HARIS GAMING
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Cryptography Guide

This guidebook contains instructions on how to use the ciphers/codes that will
be tested in the module.

Caesar cipher:
The Caesar cipher, also known as a shift cipher, is one of the simplest forms of encryption. It is a
substitution cipher where each letter in the original message (called the plaintext) is replaced with a
letter corresponding to a certain number of letters up or down in the alphabet.

In this way, a message that initially was quite readable, ends up in a form that can not be understood
at a simple glance.
For example, here's the Caesar Cipher encryption of a message, using a left shift of 3.
Plaintext:
THE QUICK BROWN FOX JUMPS OVER THE LAZY DOG Ciphertext:
QEB NRFZH YOLTK CLU GRJMP LSBO QEB IXWV ALD
Note: To decrypt, we use right shifts (shift forward).
Caesar’s cipher is identical to the cipher called ROT(n), where n represents the number of the shift.

The Vigenère Cipher


The Vigenère cipher, was invented by a Frenchman, Blaise de Vigenère in the 16th century. It is a
polyalphabetic cipher because it uses two or more cipher alphabets to encrypt the data. In other words,
the letters in the Vigenère cipher are shifted by different amounts, normally done using a word or
phrase as the encryption key. Unlike the monoalphabetic ciphers, polyalphabetic ciphers are not
susceptible to frequency analysis, as more than one letter in the plaintext can be represented by a
single letter in the encryption.

The Vigenère Square: Blaise de Vigenère developed a square to help encode messages. Reading along
each row, you can see that it is a really a series of Caesar ciphers the first has a shift of 1, the second a
shift of 2 and so.
The Vigenère Square: Blaise de Vigenère developed a square to help encode messages. Reading along
each row, you can see that it is a really a series of Caesar ciphers the first has a shift of 1, the second a
shift of 2 and so.

The Vigenère cipher uses this table in conjunction with a key to encipher a message.
So, if we were to encode a message using the key COUNTON, we write it as many times as necessary
above our message. To find the encryption, we take the letter from the intersection of the Key letter
row, and the Plaintext letter column.
key c o u n t o n c o u n t o n
Plain text v i g e n e r v i g e n e r
Encryption X W A R G S E G Q C C A S E

To decipher the message the recipient needs to write out the key above the ciphertext and reverse the
process.
ADFGX Cipher:
After the invention of the telegraph, it was now possible for individuals to communicate across entire
countries instantaneously using Morse code. Unfortunately, it was also possible for anyone with the
right equipment
to wiretap a line and listen in on exchanges. Moreover, most people had to rely on clerks to encode
and decode messages, making it impossible to send plaintext clandestinely. Once again, ciphers
became important.
Germany created a new cipher based on a combination of the Polybius checkerboard and ciphers
using key words. It was known as the ADFGX cipher, because those were the only letters used in the
cipher. The Germans chose these letters because their Morse code equivalents are difficult to confuse,
reducing the chance of errors.
The first step was to create a matrix that looked a lot like the Polybius checkerboard:
Cryptographers would use pairs of cipher letters to represent plaintext letters. The letter's row
becomes the first cipher in the pair, and the column becomes the second cipher. In this example, the
enciphered letter "B" becomes "AD," while "O" becomes "FG." Not all ADFGX matrices had the
alphabet plotted in alphabetical order.
Next, the cryptographer would encipher his message. Let's stick with "How Stuff Works." Using this
matrix, we'd get "DFFGXD GFGGGXDADA XDFGGDDXGF."
The next step was to determine a key word, which could be any length but couldn't include any
repeated letters. For this example, we'll use the word DEUTSCH. The cryptographer would create a
grid with the key word spelled across the top. The cryptographer would then write the enciphered
message into the grid, splitting the cipher pairs into individual letters and wrapping around from one
row to the next.

Next, the cryptographer would rearrange the grid so that the letters of the key word were in
alphabetical order, shifting the letters' corresponding columns accordingly:

He would then write out the message by following down each column (disregarding the letters of the
key word on the top row). This message would come out as "DDG DFDD FGAD GAG XXFF GGDG
FGXX." It's probably clear why this code was so challenging -- cryptographers enciphered and
transposed every plaintext character. To decode, you would need to know the key word (DEUTSCH),
then you'd work backward from there. You'd start with a grid with the columns arranged
alphabetically. Once you filled it out, you could rearrange the columns properly and use your matrix
to decipher the message.

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