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Decrypting Kryptos
angkor writes "Kryptos is a sculpture located on the grounds of CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia. Installed in 1990, its thousands of characters contain encrypted messages, of which three have been solved (so far). There is still a fourth section at the bottom consisting of 97 or 98 characters which remains uncracked."
Dynamite oughtta crack it...
Visit the Game Programming Wiki!
Dupe?
Yeah a lovely link, but what happened?
:-)
They got kryptos running linux? Microsoft patents kryptos? apple sell mini-kryptos?
is this a dupe? what is the relevance in my life!!! aaaaaaaargh
heh, it would own if kryptos was just a public key... maybe I should make a sculpture out of my public key... but when it expires... bah...
#hostfile 0.0.0.0 primidi.com 0.0.0.0 www.primidi.com 0.0.0.0 radio.weblogs.com
"Stop goofing off. Get back to work"
"Let him go, Ralph. He knows what he's doing." --Otto Mann (simpsons)
And if you decrypt it all, dark suited men show up at your door and demand a kidney, or worse.
Mercury Rising anyone?
El Saladhead
What is the methodology behind code cracking? Many codes I figure eventually get solved due to something like the Rosetta Stone, but how is even that point reached?
Superman must be shaking in his boots right about now.
Etiquette is etiquette. He kills his mother but he can't wear grey trousers.
Forgive me for being cynical, but how can we be sure that this final piece is actually crackable? I mean, it would be a cruel joke by Jim Sanborn (the structure's creator) to just include a load of junk, but who's to say he didn't? The fact that the other parts have been deciphered suggests that this last part will give way eventually, but maybe that's just to make the final joke even crueler?
I hope I'm wrong because that would make this story a lot less interesting, but I just thought it should be mentioned.
apterous.org
?OBKR
UOXOGHULBSOLIFBBWFLRVQQPRNGKSSO
TWTQSJQSSEKZZWATJKLUDIAWINFBNYP
VTTMZFPKWGDKZXTJCDIGKUHUAUEKCAR
If you can't tell how many characters it has, no wonder it's so hard to crack.
Don't crack that last part people!
:-)
If you do, the artist is gonna hunt you down and sue you! (Unless she is from Harvard...)
Maybe its time the artist brings out a patch to cover up all those past security flaws
Wouldn't the key to cracking it lie in like a key inside of the code? That somewhere in the code, it explains how to decode itself. Also, by looking at the artwork itself, it looks like two semi-circles.
"We are"..."
There's more! "s", "o", "r", "r", "y"
"We are sorry"...We knew this!
"f", "p", "r" - "We are sorry for" - "t", "h", "e", - "We are sorry for the what!?!
"i", "n", "c", "o", "n", "v", "e", - almost got it - "n", "i", "e", "n", "c" "e".
"We are sorry for the inconvenience"? You bastard!!
*Apologies to DNA, who orignially used this idea as God's final message to the univers.
where that's kid from mercury rising when you need him.
Runnin' On Empty
Why would the CIA allow something that would be easy to crack on their property?!
Be Sure to drink your Ovaltine.
The article says that the NSA failed as well, but, honestly, the NSA wouldn't say if they had.
They probably have, long ago, and just don't tell anybody. They're probably chuckling about it right now.
This is just like television, only you can see much further.
what's the pink syntax all about? is it good or is it wack?
CIA cracks you!
stupid decoder ring
It's a confession that Elvis isn't dead; that he's been working for the CIA all this time, in the disguise of an Elvis impersonator.
How am I supposed to fit a pithy, relevant quote into 120 characters?
For great justice!
Here is the image
>
AT&ROFLMAO
The people who solved the first 3 are currently in jail for DCMA violations. ;^)
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
Someone could've just asked me. I'm not THAT complicated.
This is not the sig you're looking for.
Ok, slashdot has officially become a mirror for www.fark.com, this was posted yesterday. Congrats!
I HAVEN'T OWNED A TELEVISION SINCE 1967 AND ONLY WATCH MOVIES ABOUT LEFT-HANDED ALEUT LESBIAN PIPEWELDERS! FUCK HOLLYWOO
It decrypts to:
"all your base are belong to US."
Not sure why they didn't use proper English...
Weird. This guy apparently metaphorically solved section 4. But he got an email from Jim saying "Dear John, this is not the way" Did he cheat? :)
m l
http://members.aol.com/scirealm/KryptosPart4.ht
But reading the wired interview gave me the impression of the two mice pontificating about the answer...
:-)
I thikn that perhaps he (as an artist) has 'encrypted something' in a manner of:
what I want encrypted -> process -> result = somethign completely different, is this encryption?
I.e. perhaps he has done this type of encryption:
"apple" = "orange" which is impossible to crack... looking at the points where he makes too many clues, and builds something out of it, seems too vain, now I think he is worried about contradicting himself...
Perhaps he never wants it cracked, perhaps there is no solution...
Another reader idea of reading backwars, and the idea of CANDLE seem good, but again read wired interview and tell me it doesn't seem like he is a little too guarded... and 'deliberate mistakes' come on, you expect me to believe that!
Well... lets give it a go...
#hostfile 0.0.0.0 primidi.com 0.0.0.0 www.primidi.com 0.0.0.0 radio.weblogs.com
Sanborn may be referring to something he buried on the CIA grounds, though he's not saying. The decrypted text mentions a burial and gives latitude and longitude coordinates (38 57 6.5 N, 77 8 44 W), which Sanborn said referred to "locations of the agency."
GlobeXplorer shows some parkland adjacent to a collection of buildings (presumably CIA HQ), but no "X".
It's probably only a cache of Iraqi WMD, or an alien spacecraft... Move along, nothing to see here.
Now some of you like my good friend who does this sort of thing for a living know that there is very good chance the last piece of the puzzle was encrypted using a variation of Khufu, which is a 64-bit Feistel network block cipher resistant to differential cryptanalysis and since a 512-bit key gives a complexity of 2^512 you can forget about trying to crack that mother! At least that's what my good friend tells me. I'm getting tired of seeing my good friend frustrated over this, so I swear by J. Edgar's garter hose that I shall have the solution by early morning (that's Texas time, y'all), so help me God almighty! I'm just gonna ask Sanborn real nice to give me the solution and if he doesn't, well I'm just gonna do some cracking. I'm no cryptomacologist but I'm handy with a crowbar, so y'all can rest easy, we'll know the secret by tomorrow morning. Now, anyone care to spring for my airfare to Langley? Anyone want me to bring back some tofu?
EMUFPHZLRFAXYUSDJKZLDKRNSHGNFIVJ
BETWEENSUBTLESHADINGANDTHEABSENC
YQTQUXQBQVYUVLLTREVJYQTMKYRDMFD
EOFLIGHTLIESTHENUANCEOFIQLUSION
VFPJUDEEHZWETZYVGWHKKQETGFQJNCE
ITWASTOTALLYINVISIBLEHOWSTHATPO
GGWHKK?DQMCPFQZDQMMIAGPFXHQRLG
SSIBLE?THEYUSEDTHEEARTHSMAGNET
TIMVMZJANQLVKQEDAGDVFRPJUNGEUNA
ICFIELDTHEINFORMATIONWASGATHER
QZGZLECGYUXUEENJTBJLBQCRTBJDFHRR
EDANDTRANSMITTEDUNDERGRUUNDTOANU
YIZETKZEMVDUFKSJHKFWHKUWQLSZFTI
NKNOWNLOCATIONDOESLANGLEYKNOWA
HHDDDUVH?DWKBFUFPWNTDFIYCUQZERE
BOUTTHIS?THEYSHOULDITSBURIEDOUT
EVLDKFEZMOQQJLTTUGSYQPFEUNLAVIDX
THERESOMEWHERWHOKNOWSTHEEXACTL
FLGGTEZ?FKZBSFDQVGOGIPUFXHHDRKF
OCATION?ONLYWWTHISWASHISLASTMES
FHQNTGPUAECNUVPDJMQCLQUMUNEDFQ
SAGETHIRTYEIGHTDEGREESFIFTYSE
ELZZVRRGKFFVOEEXBDMVPNFQXEZLGRE
VENMINUTESSIXPOINTFIVESECONDSNO
DNQFMPNZGLFLPMRJQYALMGNUVPDXVKP
RTHSEVENTYSEVENDEGREESEIGHTMINU
DQUMEBEDMHDAFMJGZNUPLGEWJLLAETG
TESFORTYFOURSECONDSWESTIDBYROWS
"Between subtle shading and the absence of light lies the nuance of iqlusion.
It was totally invisible Hows that possible? They used the Earths magnetic field
The information was gathered and transmitted undergruund to an unknown location
Does Langley know about this? They should Its buried out there somewhere
Who knows the exact location? Only WW This was his last message
Thirty eight degrees fifty seven minutes six point five seconds north
Seventy seven degrees eight minutes forty four seconds west ID by rows"
BTW Trying to bypass the Lameness filter was harder than cracking this puzzle. *hint* *hint* Slashdot fix your goddamn code!!
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Just so everyone knows, "Langley, VA" is not the correct name. Langley is the term for the CIA place but it does not reside in Langley, VA. Its in McLean, VA.
If you read HERE You will see on the 21st of Jan 2005 that Sanborn mentioned that his method is not the way (which might mean it is!!)
m l
Update 21-Jan-2005: Finally got an email from Sanborn "Dear John, This is not the way, Jim"
http://members.aol.com/SciRealm/KryptosPart4.ht
#hostfile 0.0.0.0 primidi.com 0.0.0.0 www.primidi.com 0.0.0.0 radio.weblogs.com
A priest, a doctor, and an engineer are playing a round of golf. They get behind a pair that is playing amazingly slow. After some time they realize that these two men are blind. "What a sad way to spend one's life," said the priest. "I will say a prayer for them." "I have a good friend that is an eye surgeon," said the doctor, "maybe I could get them some help." The engineer thought for a second, "Why don't these guys play at night?"
I don't get it though.
The Internet is full. Go Away!!!
Who when first reading this thought it was an article about some KDE application? Or am I the only one?
Mathematics is made of 50 percent formulas, 50 percent proofs, and 50 percent imagination.
Well, I think the same could be said with k5 and a lot of other sites as well. You see, Slashdot is a digest, with the exception of interviews and book reviews, I don't think they publish original material at all...
"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!" - Glen Beck
FWIW, [n/t] meant there was "no text". Silly /.
My God it's a cookbook.
From the Slashdot summary:
And from the actual page: So, unless angkor is the author of the page over at elonka.com, he's plagiarised the article for his summary. Now, I understand that this can be a difficult call to make, since the article is clearly cited. However, the language of the summary ("angkor writesSadly, this is not the first time this has ever happened on Slashdot (in fact, it happens in nearly every posted article). Come on, people. If you're going to submit a story, either summarize the article in your own words or attribute your summary text to the article. And editors, pull your thumbs out of your asses and actually edit your site once in a while. In a case like this, it's pretty damned obvious that the article summary is just part of the first paragraph of TFA, and so rather than attributing the summary to the article submitter ("angkor writes ..."), use other language that makes clear the quoting ("angkor quotes from the article ...").
It is interesting to note that Elonka Dunin (one of the most prominent people involved with the cracking of Kryptos and the Cyrillic Projector) put a slashdotting in her timeline of important Kryptos events.
Hikery.net - The best hiking site ever. Made by yours truly.
It points in the right direction, towards the strongest magnetic field in the area. That just happens to not be magnetic north.
(Or threaten to make him Michael Moore's pizza boy).
No mod points, no meta-moderating/Firehose/all the other free work Slashdot wants me to do.
Tee hee
This story is a dupe... The original was posted 5 1/2 years ago. (!) Here's the original story.
Never get it. Hmm I guess the answer. Somewhere where no cracker could ever get his hands on it or would think to look.
As with all good puzzles the person who creates it has a answer somewhere.
Hey CIA would you mind showing us exactly what is at that point. Look for a time cap or something I think you are sitting on the answer to the stone.
Elonka is a dedicated hobbyist in cryptography and somewhat of an expert on steganography--hiding messages within digital images. It would be pretty funny if she had a message hiding in the Kryptos image on her site.
More info:
http://elonka.com/steganography/index.html
ALL YOUR BASE...
Error: Id10t detected
http://shit.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/01/23/2 024241
Plagiarism is a serious charge and not to be made lightly! It is not clear from context whether angkor in fact "plagiarized" the original artical, or if his submission was condensed in a 'lossy' manner for the slashdot summary.
Further, slashdot has some contributors who are sophisticated about literary and academic conventions and other contribturs who are less so. It is a Good Thing to point out problems; from such pointings-out, one may learn and improve! It is a Bad Thing to "...attribute [ascribe] to malice that which may be adequately explained by [stupidity][incompetence]", (source of quote may be Fuller, Asimov, Heinlein, or someone else; I did not originate the thought, Google results are ambiguous).
OTOH your criticism of the editing of this piece may be more supportable.
It says: "Made in China"
All your base are belong to us!
I worked for the man that did the cryptography for a couple of years after his CIA retirement. We had some insteresting conversations about abstract concepts, as well as some border line spook stuff he couldn't give details of but painted a very funny picture none the less.
What suprises me is how the 'artist' gets all the attention for this piece, and not the crypto guy. His name is not even mentioned in the posted URL.
slashdot troll = you make a compelling argument I do not like the implications of.
Elonka gave a really good presentation on Kryptos at defcon 12 last summer. To even get clerence to the yard where the sculputre was, she offered to give a talk to the CIA on stenography right after 9/11.
It was also really fun to hear about all the cloak and dagger style hints that people from within the agency were giving her.
ok, next time I promise to use the preview button
clearance / steganography / anything else stupid
. . .
George Smiley,
Asst. Attorney to
Director, National Security Agency
Chief, Central Security Service
(NSA Information Assurance Department)
Date As Decrypt Key
Re: Unauthorized Use and Disclosure of Intellectual Property
VIA FEDERAL EXPRESS
Dear Cryptanalyst,
I serve as legal counsel to the NSA Information Assurance Department, owner of extensive intellectual property rights and trademarks pertaining to the use, distribution and deployment of intelligence worldwide. In fact you may have heard of us. To make you fully understand our concern and the reach of our recognised brands throughout the world, let me put it this way, we do what RIAA only dreams they could.
It has recently come to our attention that John Doe, in personam, i.e. youself, the only possible recipient of this message has sought to circumvent our intentional copy protection of classified communications, thereby exposing our proprietary materials, name, marks, trade dress, intellectual property and good will to possible illegal misuses including but not limited to commercial exploitation or karma whoring on Slashdot.
By reading this message you have violated federal laws, including (among others) the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, the Economic Espionage Act, the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, the Wiretap Act, the Legal Lobbyist Retirement Protection Act, and the Consumer Fraud and Abuse Act, as well as State of Wisconsin Natalie Portman 3D Redistribution Act (HP Amendment). (We're the NSA, we know about that one too.)
Therefore we require that you immediately CEASE AND DESIST from any and all activities causing, leading to or which might be construed to result in the actual or potential dissemination of the proprietary information and excellent legal drafting contained herin. Under the terms of the DMCA, inter alia, we inform you that henceforth your knowledge of this text will be deemed to be a Circumvention Device, and as such we are required to place restrictions on your person. Kindly call me on the number below and await instructions. Do not move, do not try to escape, do not pass go and do not collect $200 (that's all we have left after spending $20Bln on the Great Monument to ourselves you see before you.)
Failure to comply with these requests may expose you or your organization to an action for injunctive relief or monetary damages, and any other relief permitted under state and federal law, including court costs and attorneys' fees. You may also wish to consider and examine the potential criminal consequences, under theories of aiding and abetting and conspiracy to denigrate the agencies elite avant-garde sculptural skills.
If you fail to comply with these requests we will have to invoke recourse under the Homeland Bitchslap Act of 2001.
Sincerely,
George "W" Smiley.
P.S. Son, you should have just applied through personnel. Way back when I was a junior we dreamed up this sucker distract the Russians who'd waste all their time drinking vodka and analysing it just to get one over us. Don't worry, I'll tell your Ma it was friendly fire.
. . .
.
In the UK at least, an author has stautory provision against false attribution. Fair use itself does not usually take consideration of the effect or intent. No new work was created in which a fair use rule can be applied. The effect is redistribution in a database, for which there is a ton of case law saying the incident is actionable.
Although to go into the grey area here would take too long, the person who "writes" is attributing material to themselves.
Ah, but it's Slashdot who writes "writes". Seriously, if that were my article, even if it is 5 years old, I'd be pretty pissed off at the mere lack of simple tact. A big publisher might see a need to defend their rights even apparently tenuous ones. There is a need for such commercial defences, even if it has all gone mad with the RIAA etc.
So I wonder when we'll see CoyboyNeal writes: "Today we got sued by Reuters, for the full story, please see our forthcoming 404 error
It's stupid to tread on toes. Even more stupid to encourage people to help you to tread on big companies toes.
Oh well, not that anything i said matters or anything . .
Outstanding reference. Really cracked me up.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
YOU FAIL IT HARD DICKHEAD!!!eleven!
Second page fp attempt. You make me sick.
Since slashdot is lame enough to tell me "do not use caps locks" when I try to post code, view this site (coders, you morons, add pre/non-pre to your code):
http://www.elonka.com/kryptos/transcript.html
Column 2 row 2.
There are a lot of non-random patterns. Ignore the patterns, but count them. I.E. KRYPTOS in every sentance, I.E 'ABCDEFGHIJ', consider why K is missing. Review the first column, it is the same as the alphabet going right. think why.
blah blah blah... etc etc etc...
easy crossword puzzle.
Then realized I have no chance of solving it, and went back to eating my sandwich.
One amusing thing to note though, is that someone had thrown rubber duckies in the little pool next to it!
It's obviously written in the standard galactic alphabet...
Stop the Slashdot effect! Don't read the articles!
Don't forget the FBI. They also war with the CIA and, most likely, the NSA too. Damn inter-agency rivalries. But it has proved to be useful on occasion. Operation Solo probably succeeded because the FBI managed to shut the nosy CIA guys out for the duration.
I got into the project about a year ago, and I can tell you that we (Yahoo Kryptos group) have some brilliant people trying just about everything imaginable. :)
I cant tell you how much time i've spent in the middle of the night arranging the letters in x,y grids... and even more bizzare.
I reconstructed the statue in 3D Studio Max so that i could tinker with the idea of folding the statue on itself, etc. One of the vigenere keywords in an earlier section hints at the reuse of the message, so its just an angle i've been tinkering with.
http://www.storm-seeker.com/kryptos.jpg
If anyone would like a copy of the max files to tinker with, shoot me an email at storPIZZAmseeker@gmail.com minus food
Congradulations. In addition to being a fucking moron, you failed in what looks like the only thing you know how to do.
You are now the proud owner of the You're a Fucking Moron award.
Has anyone checked if the three compass needles in three of his sculptures converge to a point with some relationship to the sculptor or his work(s)?
What about the extra cipher panel on the copy(ies) of the CIA sculpture, any hint of what that is?
Damn, I meant to submit that logged in to see any responses...
it says Sucker
"When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro"
to do ROT13?
but unfortunately the margin of this post is too small to contain it.
- Jim
#include "humorous_pop_culture_reference.h"
Elonka co-hosted this episode about 2 or 3 weeks ago and we discussed cryptography in general and touched on the specific projects that Elonka has been involved in. If you want to hear her speak, download episode 78 at the archive site.
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