Code Breakers Trivia Quiz

Answer: Atbash cipher

Atbash ciphers were used by the early Israelites to encode messages using the Hebrew alphabet. The ciphers were in use by at least 627 BC as the Hebrew tribes warred with surrounding nations. Evidence of Atbash ciphers in use can be found in the ancient text of the Book of Jeremiah, where the cipher was used to encode references to Babylon and the Chaldeans.

Answer: Caesar cipher

The Caesar cipher was used by Julius Caesar during his military campaigns. The encoding and decoding was accomplished with the use of a device containing two dials. The innermost dial is rotated so that a letter can be encoded with a displaced letter from one to twenty-five spaces away. Decoding required knowing how many letters apart the coded letter was displaced from the correct letter.

As such, it was a relatively simple code to break by any literate code breaker.

Answer: belt

Lysander's servant bore his master a message, encoded on his belt. The means of decoding this message required Lysander to wind the belt around a shaft, which fitted the words together in proper order. The message? The Persians were coming. Lysander was able to prepare for battle in time to defeat his enemy.

Answer: invisible ink

Silas Deane's contribution to the success of the American patriots was a type of invisible ink used to write messages, which were also likely encoded, on a variety of paper types. The seemingly blank pages were then transported to their destination, hidden in plain sight with other commonly carried items. Upon receipt, the invisible message was revealed when heat was applied.

Answer: Dictionary

This early cryptography was developed by John Jay and Arthur Lee using a specific edition of the dictionary. The code would be transmitted as a series of numbers that identified the various words within the message. This type of code continued to be used until 1775, when Charles Dumas designed an alphanumeric code that tied a number to a particular word.

Answer: Argyll

Archibald Campbell, the 9th Earl of Argyll, developed a code used during the Monmouth rebellion in the reign of King James II (VII of Scotland). The Earl's involvement was discovered and his coded messages diciphered. He attempted to flee, but was captured by the militia and imprisoned. On June 30, 1685, he was beheaded for his treason.

Argyll's code was eventually used as the basis for a code deployed by the Union army (but in Morse code). It was so effective that intercepted messages were published in Confederate newspapers with a reward offered for cracking the code, but nobody was able to collect.

Answer: Masonic Lodge

The Masonic cipher has long been used by the order to protect its secrets. Letters A-I were placed in a "tick-tack-toe" style box of open brackets. Letters J-M were placed within an "X-shape." Letters N-V were placed within the tick-tack-toe style box with a "dot" added and W-Z were placed within an x-shape also with the added dot. The resulting code appeared as a wide range of angles and boxes, with or without the prerequisite dots.

This code was also used during the American Civil War to transfer orders between regiments.

Answer: Choctaw

The early codetalkers during World War I were from the Choctaw tribe (Cherokee was also sometimes used). It was Choctaw that was used during key battles in France during Germany's last assaults. The Choctaw used common words and phrases within their language that closely resembled the English military word they were encoding. This form of message dissemination was fast and accurate.

In the late 1930s Hitler sent a team of anthropologists to the United States to try and learn the Native American languages. This proved too great a challenge, and the language of the Navajo was used successfully during World War II in much the same way.

Answer: Germany

The Enigma machine was invented in the 1920s by the German engineer, Arthur Scherbius. This invention allowed Germany to shuttle coded messages between divisions and was virtually unbreakable. Eventually, an Enigma machine was captured and the code broken.

These efforts were assisted with the Bombe machine, invented by British intelligence. Previously, Polish military intelligence had cracked the essential features of the Enigma machine and passed the information to Britain and France in August 1939.

Answer: blinking eyes

Denton's plane was shot down in 1965, and he became a prisoner at the infamous "Hanoi Hilton," (among several other prisons). He was held prisoner by the North Vietnamese for eight long years. He famously, and successfully, transmitted a message during an interview he was forced to give, blinking the word "torture" via Morse code throughout the duration of the interview.

He was eventually voluntarily released by the North Vietnamese in 1973, moving into a career in politics upon his return to the United States.