Welcome to the companion Web site to "Decoding Nazi Secrets,"
a two-hour NOVA
special that chronicles how the Allies succeeded in cracking the infamous
German message-coding machine, the Enigma. The program was originally broadcast
on November 9, 1999. Here's what you'll find online:
Crack the Ciphers
Jim Gillogly, who has been called "arguably the best non-government cryptanalyst in the U.S." in the field of classical (historical) cryptosystems, offers three World War II-style ciphers of different levels of difficulty for you to try to break.
Send a Coded Message (Hot Science)
Manipulate an online version of an Enigma-like machine to encode your own message, then e-mail that message to a friend with instructions on how to decode it using a secret key.
A Simple Cipher (Hot Science)
Learn some of the tricks codebreakers use to solve ciphers, then use your new talents to make sense of what looks like a bunch of gibberish.
Are Web Transactions Safe?
Secret codes are not just for spies; they protect your online credit-card purchases, for instance. This feature looks at all the ways encryption affects you, with a special emphasis on the Internet.
Mind of a Codebreaker
Led by Alan Turing, inventor of the computer, the codebreakers of Bletchley Park were a brilliant, quirky bunch who broke the Engima in large part by learning to think like the German codemakers themselves.
How the Enigma Works
The Enigma looks roughly like a typewriter, but it is infinitely more complex, with fully 17,576 ring settings for each of 60 possible wheel orders—and that is just to set it up for use.
NOVA Online is produced for PBS by the WGBH Science Unit
Major funding for NOVA is provided by the Park Foundation, The Northwestern Mutual Life Foundation, and CNET.com.
