Books about Cryptography (found 2053 titles)

The Cat's Elbow and Other Secret Languages

Presents instructions for speaking thirteen secret languages, including Pig Latin, one of the best known and easiest codes to learn, and Boontling, developed by people in a California town.

Customes reviews 2

A lot of fun (2005-05-06)

Back when I was in the 4th grade, I would constantly try to think of codes with my friends. Now, three years later, I came upon this book. Sadly, there were only three people who checked it out before me, in the eighties. If people knew about this book, I am sure they would love it. I highly recommend it, whether your a 4th grader who takes this stuff seriously, or a 7th grader and up just looking for some fun. A not fo nuf guages-lan!

How many languages can you think of? (2000-05-07)

How many languages do you think there are in the world? Well the answer is that there are countless languages worldwide! Every time every day people are inventing new ways to speak and lots of different sounds. This new book,The cats elbow and other secret languages has about one fiftieth of all the languages there are in the whole world. although the most common ones are split by their accent. In english is not split up by their accent, but in spanish, in spain the states are split up by their accents like in Galicia they speak a spanish version Gallego. Well the book only say one of the secret languages spoken between armies and cops. In world war two many countries spoke coded languages and sent messages that only that army knew so the enemies wouldn't understand. It has man interesting languages. I can bet that one of those languages in the book was used during battles or even one of the world wars. I recommend this book to people who read about the following authors or characters: Marvin Miller, Nancy Drew, Scooby doo, Encyclpedia Brown, Sherlock Holmes, and the author of The cats elbow and other secret languages. ........................................ so I read this book and I loved it because its one of those rare books that draws the reader in with the first paragraph into turning the pages until the end. I compare this book to like Codemaster one and two because codemaster shows you codes to code and decode messages written, but this book shows to SAY messages in another language sort of like a code.

How to Keep a Secret: Writing and Talking in Code

Presents various methods of writing, speaking, and signaling secret messages.

Allied and Axis Signals Intelligence in World War II (Studies in Intelligence)

The importance of codebreaking and signals intelligence in the diplomacy and military operations of World War II is reflected in this study of the cryptanalysts, not only of the US and Britain, but all the Allies. The codebreaking war was a global conflict in which many countries were active. The contributions reveal that, for the Axis as well as the Allies, success in the signals war often depended upon close collaboration among alliance partners.

Customes reviews 1

A Timely Overview by Thorough Professionals (2000-01-14)

I recommend this multiauthored text to everyone interested in the history of code breaking immediately prior to and during WW II. Numerous books on the technical aspects of the efforts to solve Enigma have been published. This volume goes beyond the technical issues and explores in considerable detail issues of security which impacted on cooperative efforts between the American and British code breakers. In addition it provides a fascinating view of the concurrent activities by the Germans and Japanese authorities which convinced our enemies, at the time, that their codes were not being read. One chapter contrasts the release of information from US and British archives and in doing so provides an insight into cultural differences between the two groups. I found the references for almost all the articles to be extremely interesting and quite revealing of the wealth of information which is yet to be evaluated and digested by competent historians.

Code Breaking: A History and Exploration (History & Politics)

Code breaking has always played a key role in espionage. Now, with the advent of electronic banking and wide-spread concerns about personal privacy, the issues surrounding the coding and decoding of information are more important than ever before'

Customes reviews 13

great introduction to cryptography (2010-06-16)

This book takes you through the history of each of the techniques in cryptology and clearly explains how they work. After reading this book you can easily apply these techniques, though they are rudimentary to these days standards they are still interesting, plus the average person would not know how to use decipher them without the knowledge from this book. The author keeps the reader engaged throughout the whole entire book. For these reasons this book gets a solid 5 stars.

Excellent introduction... not just gospel (2007-09-16)

The author does a good job of introducing concepts with useful examples that encourage the reader to work along. There is also a number of interesting historical accounts of usage.

The book could use a bit of updating now though, ten years after being originally published in 1997. In terms of computational power and encryption research, that's several generations, meaning recommended RSA key lengths have changed considerably and new encryption techniques are in use, most notably AES. It's also unfortunate the book was not updated when it was translated to English in mid-to-late 1998 since the EFF DES Cracker had just completed it's historic 3 day crack of a DES message. The book also doesn't mention the 1997 RSA Challenge which spawned that project (as well spawning the first successful DES cracking effort, DESCHALL, in 1997).

Lastly, the author provides unsubstantiated opinion at a few points in the book. The most memorable being on page 209, where he responds to champions of data protection who oppose authorities gaining the ability to read encoded messages by saying that he "...lived altogether ten years under two dictatorships and value the democracy under which I have now lived nearly fifty years - despite some of its drawbacks. That is why I would grant our government the right to control encrypted data traffic in justified cases - [possibly by depositing] the key with a state authority, while a private group would make sure that the state does not abuse this privilege." He provides no justification for this opinion, or for the apparent disregard for his years under a dictatorship which one would think provided a healthy dose of skepticism about:
* a government promising to not abuse its power (where the "bar" for justification drops until it is really no longer even a bar)
* the ability of any group to effectively monitor the government for abuse
* the chance that the monitoring group itself hasn't been compromised by supporters of the government

Despite these short comings, it is definitely worth a read for what it is: a good introduction and a good historical reference.

A Short History of Secret Writing (2006-12-03)

Rudolf Kippenhahn wrote this in German, it was translated into English by Ewald Osers. Mathematician Kippenhahn wrote this very readable book because of his interest in cryptology. It covers a very technical subject and makes it easy to understand for the average reader. The German authorship gives it a viewpoint that differs from the American or English books on this subject. Most of the chapters run about 20 pages. Only a few books are listed for further reading.

The short chapters and the well-written text makes it a quick-paced read. Chapter 8 describes "Shuffled Texts" and their historic use by scientists. Chapter 9 tells of rotors and their use in enciphering. It tells of the secret of the Enigma and its hidden flaw. `Ultra' helped to win the Battle of Britain and was crucial to the Battle of the Atlantic (Chapter 10). The author does not mention Vernam's invention was used in 1917; its no secret (p.201). The decipherment of teletype messages led to the development of electronic computers. [The cover name for this was "weather research".] Governments intercept and decipher messages from other governments, and people (Chapter 11). Kippenhahn discusses the encryption of messages using public and private keys (Chapter 12). Is PGP safe from any government (p.232)? Chapter 13 tells about banking with Smart Cards. These are used in Europe and store more information than on a magnetic strip (pp.245-246). A charged money card is possible for electronic money (p.249). This does not protect anonymity. There are other problems (p.254). A signature on a fax can be copied to another fax (p.255). A separate message is needed to authenticate it (p.256). RSA encryption can't be cracked by a lone hacker, only by a large scale effort (p.261). Your government is using your tax money for this.

A good general Overview (2005-04-27)

Although this book has recieved some hard press from the industry, it is considered by many people in the technical community as a very good general introduction to Cryptography that doesn't require the user to be a math savant. I would highly recommend this book to anyone that would like to get their feet wet with Crypto

Finally Something You Don't Need a PhD to Understand (2004-11-20)

It is very difficult to find a book on the subject of Cryptology which does not go into great detail about the math, forgoing the necessary context to understanding. I have read many book on the subject and wish I had read this one first, if not early on.

Kippenhahn has accomplished that which others haven't. Providing the historical context based upon a particular crypto advancement. Instead of the entire history of the subject, he provides sections of chapters which focus on some aspect of the history, not for history sake, but to have the reader understand a particular advancement or application of cryptology.

By understanding, I'm talking about providing a lot of visual material. Monalphabetic maps, key tables, turning grilles, Vigenere tables, and others. All of these are very clearly displayed and understandable by any student or adult. He also provides simple "schematics" for cipher machines (switches and lights), which again give you the context to then understand (conceptually) what is behind Enigma machines and the like.

He introduces symmetric and asymmetric systems, such as DES and RSA respectively. First conceptually, then with a bit more detail behind it. His discussion on RSA includes an appendix which explains the math to mere mortals. Actual example keys are derived using two examples. If you're interested in why the math "works" you'll need to refer to another source. This shows the process for creating N, E, and D, the keys which support an RSA keyset.

An introduction to the application of some of the techniques in the book include some theoretical banking examples, and smart cards.

In summary, unless you already have an advanced understanding of the subject matter and math, I strongly encourage you to obtain and enjoy this quite readable 260 page book. You'll finish it fairly quickly and have enough of an understanding of the field to delve deeper if you wish - but won't have to.

Lu and Clancy's Secret Codes

In Secret Codes, kids must help the dynamic detective duo Lu and Clancy decipher 16 secret codes in order to unravel the mystery of Lu's missing sister. The book combines an entertaining, easy-to-read story with step-by-step instructions for hands-on detective activities. Playful illustrations add to the fun of the chase, while answers at the back of each book let readers know if they are on the right track.

Elliptic Curves and Their Applications to Cryptography: An Introduction

Since their invention in the late seventies, public key cryptosystems have become an indispensable asset in establishing private and secure electronic communication, and this need, given the tremendous growth of the Internet, is likely to continue growing. Elliptic curve cryptosystems represent the state of the art for such systems. Elliptic Curves and Their Applications to Cryptography: An Introduction provides a comprehensive and self-contained introduction to elliptic curves and how they are employed to secure public key cryptosystems. Even though the elegant mathematical theory underlying cryptosystems is considerably more involved than for other systems, this text requires the reader to have only an elementary knowledge of basic algebra. The text nevertheless leads to problems at the forefront of current research, featuring chapters on point counting algorithms and security issues. The Adopted unifying approach treats with equal care elliptic curves over fields of even characteristic, which are especially suited for hardware implementations, and curves over fields of odd characteristic, which have traditionally received more attention. Elliptic Curves and Their Applications: An Introduction has been used successfully for teaching advanced undergraduate courses. It will be of greatest interest to mathematicians, computer scientists, and engineers who are curious about elliptic curve cryptography in practice, without losing the beauty of the underlying mathematics.

Customes reviews 1

A balanced, nice introduction to elliptic curve cryptography (2000-07-29)

This book gives a straightforward introduction to the theory of elliptic curves as applied to cryptography and is written for those individuals without a strong background in abstract mathematics. The authors summarize the ideas behind public key cryptography in the first chapter and then move on to the group law on elliptic curves. The best part of this chapter is the explicit calculations the author gives for the group operations, espeically over fields of characteristic 2. The author chooses not to prove the associativity of the group operation geometrically bust uses the isomorphism between the curve and the degree zero part of its Picard group. This approach on the surface might seem abstract for those not having a background in algebraic geometry but the author does a good job of giving an intuition about the Picard group. A reader with a basic background in complex variable theory should find the discussion very understandable. Chapter 3 gives a thorough discussion of elliptic curves over finite fields, those being relevant to cryptographic applications. Explicit calculations are given for the Weil pairing and Hasse's theorem is proved in detail. Dissapointingly, the author does not give explicit proofs for the cases of supersingular curves but instead refers the reader to the literature. More discussion on the supersingular case might be warranted here so as to give an idea on its limitations in elliptic curve cryptography. The chapter on the discrete logarithm problem is nicely written with discussions of the different attacks done in detail.Some pseudocode inserted in the text would have been nice. The last chapter concerns calculating the order of the group, and the author does a good job of discussing the Baby-Step Giant-Step algorithm and Schoof's algorithm. The important idea of isogeny is discussed briefly in this chapter but proofs relating isogenies and modular polynomials are omitted entirely and the reader is referred to the literature. It would have been nice if the author could have taken this difficult theory and distilled it down to a form that is similar to the rest of the book. Such an intuitive discussion would have proven to be invaluable and would justify more the price of the book. A very expensive book but worth it for those very interested in elliptic curve cryptography.

Secure Information Networks: Communication and Multimedia Security (IFIP Advances in Information and Communication Technology)

This book presents a state-of-the-art review of current perspectives on communications and multimedia security. It examines requirements, issues, and solutions pertinent to securing information networks according to a multi-disciplinary approach covering research aspects, legal aspects, and applications. A wide spectrum of topics is discussed, including: + network security (ATM, ISDN, TCP/IP); + web security; + protocols for entity authentication and key agreement; + protocols for mobile environments; + applied cryptology; + watermarking; + smart cards. This volume contains papers presented at the fourth Joint Working Conference on Communications and Multimedia Security (CMS'99), sponsored by the International Federation for Information Processing (IFIP) and held on September 20--21, 1999, in Leuven, Belgium. It constitutes essential reading for information security specialists, computer professionals, communication systems professionals, EDP managers and auditors, and researchers in the area.

Advances in Cryptology - CRYPTO '99: 19th Annual International Cryptology Conference, Santa Barbara, California, USA, August 15-19, 1999 Proceedings (Lecture Notes in Computer Science)

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 19th Annual International Cryptology Conference, CRYPTO '99, held in Santa Barbara, California in August 1999. The 38 revised full papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from a total of 167 submissions. Also included is an invited survey paper. The papers are organized in topical sections on public-key cryptanalysis, secure communication and computation, distributed cryptography, secret-key cryptography, message authentication codes, traitor tracing, differential power analysis, signature schemes, zero knowledge, asymmetric encryption, electronic cash, and protocols and broadcasting.

Satellite Encryption

More than 2000 satellites will be in orbit by the year 2003. The implications of the coming boom in satellites are revolutionary for those who did not have access to secure data in remote locations around the world. This book will discuss how the new satellites (SubLEOs, LEOs, MEOs and GEOs) will carry encrypted high-speed voice calls from hand-held phones; and, depending on the system, low and high-speed digital data. In addition to satellite encryption use by commercial organizations and governments, this book is a step above any other satellite communication books through its presentation of a secure encrypted wireless environment encompassing direct satellite communications and land-based communications links.
This book will leave little doubt that a new world infrastructure in the area of satellite communications and encryption is about to be constructed. The text will benefit organizations and governments, as well as their advanced citizens. For the disadvantaged regions of the world, however, the coming satellite communications revolution could be one of those rare technological events that enable traditional societies to leap ahead and long-dormant economies to flourish in security.
The first part of this book identifies the role of satellite encryption technology trends with regards to the pace that national cryptography policy must keep up with, the political environment; and the significant changes in the post-Cold War environment that call attention to the need for and the impact a cryptography policy would have domestically and internationally. The second part of the book describes the instruments and goals of the current U.S. satellite encryption policy and some of the issues raised by current policy. The third part of the book covers development, implementation and management of advanced satellite encryption options and strategies that will forever change how organizations do business now and in the foreseeable future. The fourth part of the book discusses the misuse of satellite encryption technology by the government, the international community, international and domestic terrorist organizations, and domestic and international criminal organizations. The fifth part the book evaluates enlarging the space of possible satellite encryption policy options, and offers findings and recommendations. It also evaluates the results of implementing advanced satellite encryption technology strategies presented in previous chapters. In addition, it also covers satellite encryption security threats and solutions on how to prevent them in the future.



Key Features
* Shows governments and organizations around the world how satellite encryption helps to preserve vital national secrets, limit attacks on a nation's information infrastructure, and eliminate security and authentication obstacles to electronic commerce
* Discusses how, in the wrong hands, satellite encryption can be used to plan or cover up domestic and international crimes or overseas military operations
* Provides a thorough discussion of how the F.B.I. and National Security Agency seek to preserve their ability to intercept and decode domestic and international communications, and thus would like to inhibit the use of PKE (Public Key Exchange) in satellite communications to generate unbreakable codes
* Continues the discussion of how stopping PKE altogether may be technically impossible, and raises constitutional issues
* Practical tips on how satellite encryption will make PCI (Peripheral Component Interconnect) based computers, modems, web browsers and set-top-boxes safer for intellectual property distribution and electronic commerce through the hardware implementation of PCI compatible real-time data encryption/decryption chip solutions

Customes reviews 17

A Little more X-Files Than Engineering (2000-02-24)

While this book covers all the significant technology in the area, it is a much better read for all those things you wondered about in Sci Fi Could they really do that? Also the policy issues are critical to our privacy rights and conversly national security.

Not for those interested in Cryptography (1999-11-29)

I think that the tittle of this book is a bit misleading. If one reads through all the enthusiastic reviews of the book one can actually get a clear picture of what it is about. It is a general overview of politics of encryption with some technical information included in between. I cannot understand the reason for more than one hundred pages of information about different types of military equipment. Yes, this book is interesting but it is not about cryptography and encryption. These subjects are only a small part of the book. I returned Satellite Encryption after very thorough consideration.

Highly Accessible, Immensely Informative (1999-11-09)

Anyone who uses a mobile phone, relies upon oversees Internet connectivity, or worries about personal security should get acquainted with this book. Mr. Vacca has once again produced a very accessible yet easily readable tome on the dangers and promise of satellite encryption. Pick it up and you'll learn about or government policies regarding satellite communications management and security. By the time you put it down, you'll understand everything from pagers to the electronic battlefield. It's a must-read!

Great book (1999-11-05)

Great book - detailed and technical, but still a good read

Technically detailed, and great reading as well (1999-10-27)

As always, John Vacca provides an incredible level of detail in a readable manner. The Internet implications are particularly applicable to almost any reader. In our case, where the line-of-sight constraints of radio transmission in our wireless WANs are forcing us to look at satellite options, this book is an invaluable resource. And the tales told herein about encryption break-ins and techniques make fascinating reading in their own right.

Technical from orbit to chip, and immensely readable as well!

Russian Cryptology During World War II

This previously TOP SECRET (Code Word SUEDE) document is a reproduction without changes of the National Security Agency document NR 1310 CBHD15 11803A. Text contains six parts: Sources of Information, Organization of Cryptology in the Red Worker and Peasant Army, Organization of Cryptology in the People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs, Organization of Cryptology in Other Agencies, the Basic Systems as found in Russian Cryptology, and Areas and Dates of Use of the Basic Systems.

Customes reviews 1

Insights into how American Forces analyze foreign crypto (2000-08-22)

This book is written in standard outline form, and although the information is 50 years old, it gives the reader a sense of how our own cryptographic researchers investigate foreign cryptographic capabilities. There are specific descriptions of Russian code books and code systems, and references to the methods of cryptanalysis used against the system, and some general remarks as to weakness' within those systems.

This is an excellent read for history buffs, as the material contains many specific dates and events, with an overall analysis aimed at appraising the Russian crypto program during WWII. The text is the content of a NSA report, that was once classified as TOP SECRET, but is now unclassified, thanks probably, to the Freedom of Information Act. The only negative thing to be said about this book, is it's brevity, as it is only 50 printed pages.

Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192 193 194 195 196 197 198 199 200 201 202 203 204 205 206

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