# I need a simple breakable cypher **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [August 13, 2006, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-simple-breakable-cypher/368568 "2006-08-13T17:12:48Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![drachillix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/48db29/32.png) [@drachillix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drachillix)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2006, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-simple-breakable-cypher/368568/21 "2006-08-14T14:44:30Z")
> [@DesertDog](#): > > A code is the substitution of words or phrases by other words or phrases. For example if “_Mother baked apple pies while Uncle John watched._” really means “_General Smith will arrive in Washington by air at 3pm._” that’s a code/. Watch a couple episodes of the Sopranos and you will hear tons of this used. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2006, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-simple-breakable-cypher/368568/22 "2006-08-14T14:52:08Z")
A good example of a cipher that makes sense either side of coding is Conan Doyle’s _Dancing Men_, from the Sherlock Holmes story _The Adventure of the Dancing Men_. > **[The Adventure of the Dancing Men](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Adventure_of_the_Dancing_Men)** > > The Adventure of the Dancing Men is a Sherlock Holmes story written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle as one of 13 stories in the cycle published as The Return of Sherlock Holmes in 1905. It was first published in The Strand Magazine in the United Kingdom in December 1903, and in Collier's in the United States on 5 December 1903. > Doyle ranked "The Adventure of the Dancing Men" third in his list of his twelve favorite Holmes stories. This is one of only two Sherlock Holmes short stories where Holmes' ... What I mean by ‘makes sense’ here is that it looks just like a bunch of doodles, rather than a nonsensical string of coded characters, demanding decipherment. I’m pretty sure also, that given a big enough volume of text in which to hide it, and a short enough message, it would be possible to encode a message without rendering the carrier text unreadable or ungrammatical, in the same sort of way that Digimark codes can be embedded in images without noticeably changing them. OK, it’s perhaps a bit easier in images, because subtly changing the hue or brightness of one pixel here and there can easily go unnoticed, however, I think a similar thing could be done with text, providing that the encoding algorithm knew enough about correct grammar, spelling and word definition - using synonyms and altered (but still valid) phraseology instead of altering pixel colours. ---
**Author:** ![StarvingButStrong](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/starvingbutstrong/32/335_2.png) [@StarvingButStrong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StarvingButStrong)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2006, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-simple-breakable-cypher/368568/23 "2006-08-14T14:55:43Z")
> [@Priceguy](#): > > “ **Priceguy** is a…” hey! > > Joking aside, one of us has made a mistake somewhere, 'cause currently I decrypt your message as KTRAIGHTDOPEENXCB. I can’t get the first letter to be an S and I have no clue what ENXCB is. > > Great method, though. Thanks. Ah, screwed up, did I? I’m not surprised: I was posting about 4 a.m. after a pleasant evening of wine and crackers and more wine… More seriously, no matter how often I reminded myself that 0 (zero) = even, my mind kept reading it as O (letter O) = odd. I caught and fixed that mistake many times, obviously not enough. Glad the cypher works for your game, but I suggest you double or triple check your coded message. ---
**Author:** ![StarvingButStrong](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/starvingbutstrong/32/335_2.png) [@StarvingButStrong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StarvingButStrong)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2006, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-simple-breakable-cypher/368568/24 "2006-08-14T15:00:26Z")
> [@Priceguy](#): > > I just coded my message using your method, **StarvingButStrong**. Perfect. I can even rather easily drop little hints throughout the scenario. It’ll be really interesting to see if my players manage to break it. Do you mean, hints in the coded text (Five is my favorite number) (Who’d have thought I’d ever find a use for binary) and such? Or hints outside the message, like leaving a chart with the alphabet and their binary equivalents tucked conspicuously in a book? The latter sounds neater. Do let us know if your guests turn out to be code breakers. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Dunderman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecb155/32.png) [@Dunderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dunderman)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2006, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-simple-breakable-cypher/368568/25 "2006-08-14T15:30:30Z")
> [@StarvingButStrong](#): > > Do you mean, hints in the coded text (Five is my favorite number) (Who’d have thought I’d ever find a use for binary) and such? Or hints outside the message, like leaving a chart with the alphabet and their binary equivalents tucked conspicuously in a book? The latter sounds neater. Something like the latter. I’m thinking that they could find cryptic notes scribbled by the guy receiving the code as he got that month’s code over the phone. > [@](#): > > Do let us know if your guests turn out to be code breakers. 🙂 I will. ---
**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:** [August 14, 2006, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-simple-breakable-cypher/368568/26 "2006-08-14T17:42:19Z")
> [@](#): > > I’m pretty sure also, that given a big enough volume of text in which to hide it, and a short enough message, it would be possible to encode a message without rendering the carrier text unreadable or ungrammatical, in the same sort of way that Digimark codes can be embedded in images without noticeably changing them. > OK, it’s perhaps a bit easier in images, because subtly changing the hue or brightness of one pixel here and there can easily go unnoticed, however, I think a similar thing could be done with text, providing that the encoding algorithm knew enough about correct grammar, spelling and word definition - using synonyms and altered (but still valid) phraseology instead of altering pixel colours. There was an example of this in the _Series of Unfortunate Events_ movie (presumably also in the book, but I haven’t read that one). A charater known for her impeckable spelling left a seeminly-innocuous note for the children, but with mispellings scattered through it. The letters involved in the misspellings speeled out a secret mesage. ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2006, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-simple-breakable-cypher/368568/27 "2006-08-14T18:40:47Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > There was an example of this in the _Series of Unfortunate Events_ movie (presumably also in the book, but I haven’t read that one). A charater known for her impeckable spelling left a seeminly-innocuous note for the children, but with mispellings scattered through it. The letters involved in the misspellings speeled out a secret mesage. CKGSES? I _knew_ it! ---
**Author:** ![Dunderman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecb155/32.png) [@Dunderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dunderman)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2006, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-simple-breakable-cypher/368568/28 "2006-09-03T15:38:18Z")
[QUOTE=StarvingButStrong] Do let us know if your guests turn out to be code breakers. [/QUOTE] Bumping this to give the answer. They weren’t, but they were soooooooo close to solving it that I had all the trouble in the world keeping a straight face when they were working at it. ---
**Author:** ![StarvingButStrong](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/starvingbutstrong/32/335_2.png) [@StarvingButStrong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StarvingButStrong)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2006, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-simple-breakable-cypher/368568/29 "2006-09-03T17:33:47Z")
[QUOTE=Priceguy] Bumping this to give the answer. They weren’t, but they were soooooooo close to solving it that I had all the trouble in the world keeping a straight face when they were working at it. [/QUOTE] Too bad! I hope they were able to solve the overall mystery by other routes. And thanks for letting me know. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2006, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-simple-breakable-cypher/368568/30 "2006-09-03T17:41:10Z")
Simple, funny and genuine from just the other day: [AN Wilson is a shit](http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-2330457,00.html). ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2006, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-simple-breakable-cypher/368568/31 "2006-09-03T18:56:04Z")
I imagine that it was just too hard, but if you can figure out [this](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=7247973&postcount=11) then by all means feel free to use the encryption method. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-a-simple-breakable-cypher/368568.md?page=1)