Benjamin Franklin's Codes and Ciphers

[jberryhill]

This is an interesting timeline of codes and ciphers used by Benjamin Franklin.

http://www.h4.dion.ne.jp/~room4me/america/code/frankli2.htm

Cryptology was, of course, essential in those days, because there was no secure form of long distance communication. Unless you could afford your own couriers to send single messages (who could still be captured or otherwise waylaid) letters were carried by traders and other travelers who were going in the direction of your addressee. These would be exchanged at various points, such as inns and taverns in order to route them to their destinations.

All of the founders had a keen interest in codes and ciphers, since they never would have assumed that any correspondence was physically secure from being read by any number of people along the way.

[Recursion]

1. Steganography was very popular back then

Hiding a coded message in an apparently innocuous message (simple example: write a letter and then put little dots over the letters that compose the secret message).

Cryptography in the modern sense began with Kerckhoff in the 1860s, who established that the security in any cryptosystem resides entirely in its key.

[pansypoo53219]

2. that had to make writing by quill even harder.

[pinboy3niner]

3. It's a shame that Ben and the guys lived before the invention...

...of the Little Orphan Annie Decoder Ring.