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Dan Brown - "Digital Fortress" Quiz

Have you read "Digital Fortress"? How well do you know the characters and quotes from the book?

A multiple-choice quiz by rpeeves. Estimated time: 3 mins.

Author
rpeeves

Time
3 mins

Type
Multiple Choice

Quiz #
244,416

Updated
Dec 03 21

# Qns
10

Difficulty
Average

Avg Score
7 / 10

Plays
1270

One at a Time - Single Page - Timed Game

Question 1 of 10

1. What is the name of the lead female character? Hint

Scarlett O'Hara

Susan Fletcher

Vittoria Vetra

Sophie Neveu

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Question 2 of 10

2. Who was Ensei Tankado exchanging emails with? Hint

NDakota

Susan Fletcher

Greg Hale

Commander Strathmore

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Question 3 of 10

3. What is the name of the decoding machine used by the NSA? Hint

TRANSLTR

TRANSISTOR

TRANSFORMER

TRANSLATOR

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Question 4 of 10

4. How does David Becker sign all his letters and notes to Susan? Hint

Without Love

Sincerely

Without wax

With Love

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Question 5 of 10

5. What was Susan Fletcher's IQ? Hint

190

160

170

180

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Question 6 of 10

6. What was the algorithm allegedly used by Ensei Tankado in the Digital Fortress encryption program? Hint

Rotating cleartext function

Julian Substitution

Atbash

PGP

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Question 7 of 10

7. What is the name of the Japanese company that was interested in buying the passkey to Digital Fortress? Hint

Numatech Corp.

Honda

Misubishi Corp

NTT-Docomo

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Question 8 of 10

8. Jabba the Hutt was the name of the System Security Chief for the NSA.

True

False

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Question 9 of 10

9. Who is the director of the NSA? Hint

Midge Milken

Leland Fontaine

Trevor Strathmore

Condaleeza Rice

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Question 10 of 10

10. What was the answer to the question of the virus? Hint

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Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts

1. What is the name of the lead female character?

Answer: Susan Fletcher

Great mind! Masters in Mathematics from Johns Hopkins and on a full scholarship from MIT studying number theory. Now that's what I call a number cruncher!

2. Who was Ensei Tankado exchanging emails with?

Answer: NDakota

NDakota is an anagram for Tankado! Clever, but apparently missed out by those cryptographers!

3. What is the name of the decoding machine used by the NSA?

Answer: TRANSLTR

TRANSLTR - with three million processors running in parallel, no wonder it's the ultimate codebreaker.

4. How does David Becker sign all his letters and notes to Susan?

Answer: Without wax

Without wax in Spanish is "sin cera", cera meaning wax and sin meaning without. Literally, without wax or sin cera was the root of "Sincerely".

5. What was Susan Fletcher's IQ?

Answer: 170

An IQ of 170 would've qualified Susan for membership in MENSA.

6. What was the algorithm allegedly used by Ensei Tankado in the Digital Fortress encryption program?

Answer: Rotating cleartext function

From the book:

"The notion of a rotating cleartext function was first put forth in an obscure, 1987 paper by a Hungarian mathematician, Josef Harne. Because brute-force computers broke codes by examining cleartext for identifiable word patterns, Harne proposed an encryption algorithm that, in addition to encrypting, shifted decrypted cleartext over a time variant. In theory, the perpetual mutation would ensure that the attacking computer would never locate recognisable word patterns and thus never know when it had found the proper key. The concept was somewhat like the idea of colonising Mars-fathomable on an intellectual level, but, at present, well beyond human ability."

However, this is not possible. See http://becomingparanoid.com/2006/03/13/digital-fortress-what-dan-brown-got-wrong/ for more information. PS: I'm a Mathematics graduate so I sort of understand these things.

7. What is the name of the Japanese company that was interested in buying the passkey to Digital Fortress?

Answer: Numatech Corp.

Interestingly, Numatech Corp.'s president, Tokugen Numataka, was Ensei Tankado's biological father!

8. Jabba the Hutt was the name of the System Security Chief for the NSA.

Answer: False

Jabba the Hutt was from the "Star Wars" trilogy. The name of the administrator was Jabba ONLY!

9. Who is the director of the NSA?

Answer: Leland Fontaine

Fontaine was supposed to be out of the country, but for some reason was there at the end. Probably why he is NSA chief!

10. What was the answer to the question of the virus?

Answer: 3

It is the difference between the Uranium samples used in the bombs at Hiroshima (U-235) and Nagasaki (U-238).

Source: Author rpeeves

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