Each year the FBI has an open encryption challenge:
http://www.fbi.gov/page2/dec08/code_122908.html
Here is the encrypted FBI cyphertext:
VFWTDLCSWV. YD NSLMIJFWEJFD GSW SL NIJNQBLM FOBV EJFDVF DLNIGTFBSL. KBVBF YYY.AHB.MSK/NSCDC.OFZ FS EDF WV QLSY SA GSWI VWNNDVV.
The decrypted cleartext reads:
STUPENDOUS. WE CONGRADULATE YOU ON CRACKING THIS **TEST ENCRYPTION. VISIT WWW.FBI.GOV/CODED.HTM TO LET US KNOW OF YOUR SUCCESS.
Am I the first to crack this? Google seems to think so. Will I be the recipient of an FBI home-invasion tomorrow morning (they now have my IP address)?
~UPDATE. I think I’m the second to crack this and post it for all to see. The other guy beat me by about 12 minutes.
December 29th, 2008 at 10:27 pm
mint choc + french vanilla.
you earned it.
x
December 29th, 2008 at 11:17 pm
The word you left masked is “latest”. You can get it from the transformations needed to unmask the third word.
January 8th, 2009 at 4:11 pm
ohh woppdy doo. You took www.fbi.gov and figured out the rest of the letters from that like everyone else. This wasnt a test from the FBI. If they really wanted to find a brain child they would have gave us an OTP encryption with some sort of algorithm variation.
January 9th, 2009 at 11:29 am
^^^
I don’t get some people.
This person is clearly offended/jealous that I enjoyed cracking the FBI’s official cypher challenge. So much so that s/he took the time to publicly deride my efforts.
I urge this person to focus their energy in a more positive way. Clearly this person feels strongly about this topic. Perhaps consider writing your own encryption contest (replete with OTP and algorithm variation) to give us a better challenge. This way people will learn something and have fun.