# Help me decode something **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [July 1, 2001, 5:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decode-something/70813 "2001-07-01T05:52:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Opus1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/858c86/32.png) [@Opus1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Opus1)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2001, 5:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decode-something/70813/1 "2001-07-01T05:52:27Z")
So I’m reading rec.humor.funny and this is today’s joke: Subject: Anyone Have a Line on the Jesse Jackson Sex Tape? (Jacksons\_Big\_Hoe\_Hopper@qylo.edu) > [@](#): > > ## I would give anything to see this video. Not so much because I think he’s so hot, but just to validate what I’ve always thought about him - a degenerate, hypocritical, BIGOT! > > ## I can’t wait for the video clips to hit the Internet - LOL! > > ## (I’ll bet he’s got a small one…) > > - > - > - > - > - > - > - > - > - > > Ceai aetcd mexoanla tiec fhfcflp ottvnw a uip > aeenpr trv ognwew dohlu owedvt denn hrz > scs sfhmivl virnrt freplaei bta reltopte bepip eortktxm ver af > hsdfwuf rdngta rndta tcaald itpa eho aoserf eodta > icocbdx eirubo tpenkme sioc on tfd atei dro. > > I rfnmfti rtmfmd o wnignla oedh chit idui hie y kie ono y te! > > Jrftatdt eener nlh noiinms reist ds tp if! > > Cacd preii nniavw dddeoeil enhcces atwnbcps ffpd pimv dscp > loeu rtbc oeo uer owi taef ecnt rbe eeeti > munyyy ssqoi rintgr usfedimsh nse tcpd iaoansse o ee? > > Wlrta po cd reh re o eede fn > eri eseh actamh te meahnh wnirr ue tcyft! > > Yeroo ofiyc sl focri ostar fprtd netn ri > dbteanfes souiiun rrcs oapbr eiidxv pndf rs? > > Gmetons rnior oibtecd ract cer ine mq > lst tgyts nani pveth nsdin dntd eora ie > iielr pvxsw ehee rcea frnsa mdnlo rnrs cri ecyai to > iewo sete fdte encs ietd orno hnof. > > Daend uwfeeneh telneh y ehgyftr ahoefe eslm aioo nxottohs eaien. > > Wnamiepc fnleej oanm imifrgiia uuiehsp hpt a elspnisn eia i xot pwo? > > Nete tfn ola tn nem en looo im! > > Vcmhruyr mycfr y ptflee eiup enefgn ioenm ont hexst tcost > nt nt cifl retnb onc eggt rhs? > > Tiaepae mee y ienc tssaaed ygrtte lcir vfrsdtt eot mde eem. > > Lhngd erocswtp pdemati tettstt tohocrcr thplarom te > fratnfena anfin erivdo o ctd awndody docsuo tgsone rtrhnr tesw aa > dnr i iwfd tn mpg cqr rerc itse dern > mtoov noyof ernme ae nxi qeswa oaeg wa tni > oomnees elsb mmsn eesidda a monci rci etsedsf elrtedn cke. This newsgroup typically encodes dirty jokes in rot13, but this is clearly not rot13, nor any other simple letter substitution cypher. The only thing I can make of it is that the letter frequencies correspond pretty much to that of uncoded text: e is the most frequent, followed by t, n, i, o, and r. And j, k, q, x, and z all appear rarely. So, can someone help me decipher this? ---
**Author:** ![Triskadecamus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b19c9b/32.png) [@Triskadecamus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Triskadecamus)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2001, 6:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decode-something/70813/2 "2001-07-01T06:27:01Z")
Ask Wendell Wagner ---
**Author:** ![KidCharlemagne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ed8c4c/32.png) [@KidCharlemagne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KidCharlemagne)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2001, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decode-something/70813/3 "2001-07-01T13:42:11Z")
I read an amazing book called the Code Book which i recommend to anyone. Just from a cursory glance i can say a few things - y and o stand for i and a, not necessarily in that order. Since there seems to be stability in the y’s and o’, and their are multiple instances with three letters in a row im wondering if it doesnt have garbage letters added, especially since the avg word seems too long. Anyway ill take a look. ---
**Author:** ![friedo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8edcca/32.png) [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2001, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decode-something/70813/4 "2001-07-01T17:57:50Z")
First glance looks like a monoalphabetic substitution. Do some frequency analysis and see if you can decipher it. (I ain’t got the time, myself.) ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2001, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decode-something/70813/5 "2001-07-01T20:13:39Z")
Another thing to note: the large number of words with two initial letters. Any chance a single substitution works if you simply read it backwards? ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2001, 10:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decode-something/70813/6 "2001-07-01T22:28:33Z")
You’ve also got some letters repeated in triplicate, though, such as “munyyy”, “eeeti”, and “looo” which pretty much eliminates any sort of direct letter-subsitution. There’s also a shortage of three-letter words, and on a casual glance, I don’t see any repeated words (other than the single-letter “words” “o” and “y”). Spacing and possibly punctuation are probably arbitrary. Considering that it’s got an English letter frequency, it’s probably some sort of rearrangement cipher, of which the simplest is a fencepost, where you read every nth letter. I’m not getting anything this way offhand, but I haven’t tried every value of n. ---
**Author:** ![Sultan\_Kinkari](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/7bcc69/32.png) [@Sultan\_Kinkari](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sultan_Kinkari)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2001, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decode-something/70813/7 "2001-07-01T22:38:37Z")
I had noticed what Chronos had said and figured they were just inflections, like, “you so craaazy”. ---
**Author:** ![KidCharlemagne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ed8c4c/32.png) [@KidCharlemagne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KidCharlemagne)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2001, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decode-something/70813/8 "2001-07-01T23:41:07Z")
Its probably a multiple monoalphabetic substitution cypher. Since their are 4 single letter words (A, Y, I, O) there are probably two different cyphers that alternate one after another or randomnly. It is also strange that the two letters that one letter words must be were one of the four, that is, A and I. I wonder if there is no substitution followed by substitution etc. Then move on to two letter words. I don;t have the time right now, and it is just a joke about Jesse Jackson, but if you cant find the answer soon, ill come back and figure it out. It is trial and error. Remember that there are only a few two letter words, when you combine this with your understanding of the coding of one letter and then three letter words, the method will become clear. It just takes time. Frequency analysis probably wouldnt work cause there is probably, actually, almost definately more than one cipher alphabet. My guess is this could be decoded in an hour or less. There is the chance that the division of the letters into words is randomn, but my guess is for a joke board, it must remain a simple algorithm. Frankly, why in the nine hells does a joke board feel the need to encrpyt jokes?? ---
**Author:** ![yabob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yabob/32/2821_2.png) [@yabob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yabob)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2001, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decode-something/70813/9 "2001-07-02T00:44:26Z")
> [@](#): > > Frankly, why in the nine hells does a joke board feel the need to encrpyt jokes?? ROT13 has been a long standing tradition on USENET. It’s not that it’s intended to be hard to decode - quite the reverse (rot13 is just a simple cipher that rotates the letters 13 places, built into most newsreaders). The idea was to protect the casual reader against inadvertantly seeing objectionable material. By taking the time to decode the text, you were demonstrating that you were aware that it might be offensive, and were choosing to read it anyway. It doesn’t work that well - people just decode the stuff, read it, and get offended because they didn’t expect it to be THAT offensive, or they expected it to just be dirty, not RACIST, and so on … ---
**Author:** ![evilhanz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ba8739/32.png) [@evilhanz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/evilhanz)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2001, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decode-something/70813/10 "2001-07-02T03:28:37Z")
Unfortunately, Opus1 didn’t provide us with the entire usenet posting. Otherwise, we would have learned that this message has appeared in multiple newsgroups with different variations of the “encoded” text in each post. The original message is a solicitation for a sex tape and contains bogus headers. The obvious conclusion is that the “encoded” text is a method of avoiding various spam filtering routines - mainly the ones directed at filtering multiple identical posting to multiple, unrelated newsgroups. By using gibberish text, it will also avoid various kill file patterns. Not clever, but effective. If you have any doubts, search deja for: Jacksons\_Big\_Hoe\_Hopper As a side note, Rot-13 is only one of a family of simple text-rotation encryption methods, Rot(n), where n is the number of characters to move in the alphabet for the replacement. There’s a great utility at [http://www.flywheel.org/rot/](http://www.flywheel.org/rot/) which will decode all possible ROT variations at once. As a straight exercise in decoding, this gibberish contains a number of clues that suggest it isn’t a simple monoalphabetic substitution, the triplicate characters, double initial characters, more variations of 2- and 3-letter words than you should expect in a simple message. It might have used a rotating substitution, but again, the triplicates give it away. It would simply be too complicated for such a low-brow Usenet posting. Anything that’s encoded on Usenet is generally meant to be easily decoded. ---
**Author:** ![Opus1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/858c86/32.png) [@Opus1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Opus1)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2001, 5:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decode-something/70813/11 "2001-07-02T05:20:51Z")
> [@](#): > > Unfortunately, Opus1 didn’t provide us with the entire usenet posting. Otherwise, we would have learned that this message has appeared in multiple newsgroups with different variations of the “encoded” text in each post. The original message is a solicitation for a sex tape and contains bogus headers. The obvious conclusion is that the “encoded” text is a method of avoiding various spam filtering routines - mainly the ones directed at filtering multiple identical posting to multiple, unrelated newsgroups. By using gibberish text, it will also avoid various kill file patterns. Not clever, but effective. If you have any doubts, search deja for: Jacksons\_Big\_Hoe\_Hopper Okay, since rec.humor.funny is a moderated newsgroup, how the hell did it slip through? And, I did indeed provide the entire message. Go to rhf and look for yourself. If it’s supposed to be a solicitation for a sex tape, why isn’t there any URL or anything else that would let people actually order it? Not that I don’t believe you, but I’m still left scratching my head. ---
**Author:** ![evilhanz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ba8739/32.png) [@evilhanz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/evilhanz)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2001, 5:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decode-something/70813/12 "2001-07-02T05:24:07Z")
In the case of r.h.f, it might have been a case of the moderator being lazy. He probably removed the ad, but left the cryptic text in because it certainly **looks** like ROT-13. Or perhaps his moderation duties are performed by a script of some sort. In any case, all it takes to verify that this is not encoded text is a simple search of deja for the poster’s name. ---
**Author:** ![jmonster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/dbc845/32.png) [@jmonster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jmonster)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2001, 11:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-decode-something/70813/13 "2001-07-06T23:13:06Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by evilhanz \* > As a side note, Rot-13 is only one of a family of simple text-rotation encryption methods, Rot(n), where n is the number of characters to move in the alphabet for the replacement. There’s a great utility at [http://www.flywheel.org/rot/](http://www.flywheel.org/rot/) which will decode all possible ROT variations at once. Hey, thanks! Glad you like it!