Charles V of Spain Secret Code Cracked
Schneier on Security
NOVEMBER 29, 2022
Diplomatic code cracked after 500 years: In painstaking work backed by computers, Pierrot found “distinct families” of about 120 symbols used by Charles V. “Whole words are encrypted with a single symbol” and the emperor replaced vowels coming after consonants with marks, she said, an inspiration probably coming from Arabic. In another obstacle, he used meaningless symbols to mislead any adversary trying to decipher the message.
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