2024-04-05 07:40:00
Four years following solving the Zodiac’s most famous cipher, the three cryptographers who did it detailed their efforts in a scientific paper that explains all the techniques they tried that didn’t work, the software they wrote to help with the decryption, and their theories regarding how the original cipher was created.
The most famous Zodiac cipher, called Z340, first appeared in San Francisco newspapers on November 12, 1969, and remained undeciphered for 51 years. David Oranczak, Sam Blake and Jarl Van Eyck eventually cracked the Z340 code and explained it in a YouTube video in 2020. The FBI later confirmed that it believed the decision, posted on YouTube, was correct.
Orancak has spoken extensively regarding the decision on his YouTube page and to reporters since then, but a 29-page article published by the trio last week is the most comprehensive account yet of how the decision process was conducted and what they had to go through to achieve the goal.
Since the article is regarding a cipher that has remained a mystery for 51 years, it is quite technical. Cryptography buffs will definitely appreciate it, but the article is also interesting because it puts forward several theories regarding why the cipher was so difficult to crack. It explains how online crowdsourcing helped find a solution, but also complicated the process.
Online collaboration was an important component in finding the Z340 solution. Many participants in this search contributed in the form of forum posts, blog entries, letters, posts and videos. A major challenge in this effort was organizing the information generated by such a diverse community, consisting of participants with a wide range of skills both applicable and not applicable to cryptanalysis.
Oranczak explained that in 2012, he created a page to collect factual observations made on Zodiac ciphers over the years following realizing that crowdsourced research was useful, but that many of the conversations were controversial, so useful facts were lost in the noise.
The article also explains that the cipher was so difficult to crack because it used various alternating cryptographic techniques, and it remains unclear whether the various alternating patterns in the cipher were introduced intentionally or whether they were an accidental unintended result of the encryption process.
The full article is available find here.
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