Cracking the Code

Abstract

Since the earliest days of recorded history, cryptography—the science of encrypting and deciphering messages—has played an important and quite frequently decisive role in influencing world events. The defeat of the Persian forces of Xerxes in the Battle of Salamis near Athens in 480 B.C. was primarily due to a secret message successfully sent from Persepolis to the Greeks five years earlier, warning them about the Persian preparation for war. Two millennia later, in 1587, the interception and deciphering of encrypted messages between the imprisoned Mary Queen of Scots and her rebellious followers led to her execution and the crushing of hopes to restore Catholicism in England. The Allied Forces' access to the highly sophisticated Enigma codes and code machines in World War II was a serious blow to Nazi naval warfare and significantly contributed to the collapse of the Third Reich. Currently, with millions of financial transactions conducted over the Internet every day, the importance of encrypted messages has become even more obvious.