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Good call. So if A=O how does one find the other letters?

You would need an Alberti Cipher Disk, set the inner ring so that "o" is aligned under "A" on the outer ring and then message could be decoded. Like I said though, it could be a double encryption.

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I showed it to my three year old...

After a few seconds of looking it over; she looks up at me, says "You seriously can't figure this out? Sorry dad but I'm busy" and goes back to playing with her lalaloopsy doll.

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A = 10

B = 3

C = 3

D = 7

E = 9

F = 8

G = 0

H = 8

I = 4

J = 4

K =-7

L = 3

M = 2

N = 11

O = 7

P = 6

Q = 6

R = 10

S = 2

T = 5

U = 4

V =2

W = 2

X= 4

Y =3

Z =4

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If its world war 2 era you would be better off starting with either enigma style encryption or a derivitive or if we can rely on it being a UK code iirc they used typex machines?

Either way you would probably need one of the code books from the time I suspect.

But still good luck, I will check on this thread from time to time as I find this stuff fascinating

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As the pigeon was found dead with the code still attached to its leg, then we can be pretty certain the message didn't get to the recipient

Messages sent via pigeon would probably be fairly important to the side who sent them / were supposed to receive them or they wouldn't have been sent.

Maybe it would be possible to filter out certain major WW-II events that were successful / known about, due to receiving the message prior to the event, and just look for events that went bad due to lack of communication / surprise attacks ?

Long shot in the dark but might help :)

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As the pigeon was found dead with the code still attached to its leg, then we can be pretty certain the message didn't get to the recipient

So since it was never received does that mean the recipients key may still exist?? Or maybe after X amount of time the recipient destroyed it anyway!?!

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So since it was never received does that mean the recipients key may still exist?? Or maybe after X amount of time the recipient destroyed it anyway!?!

Good thinking, probably destroyed but there is a more likely chance of it still existing if they never received it

Either that or every message after this one made no sense because they were always one decryption behind the message :p

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if a message was sent, then 2 people knew the decryption if two people know it at least so do many O.o just need to find the grandkids of all the spies in wwII

Who says it was only for one person?

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Who says it was only for one person?

There's a good chance that no 'one person' knew the entire decryption key on their own, much like holding the keys to a vault, two people have to unlock simultaneously with a key each

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If it is encoded using a one-time pad of the same length (highly likely) it's completely impossible to crack it.

Why?

Because cracking it would return every possible combination of words or sentences of that length. Uncrackable encryption exists but you need a key at least as long as your message.

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I decoded it, it says

All your pigeon are belong to us!

[edit] Stupid double post due to neowin being incredible slow today[/edit]

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I thought anything could be cracked, given enough time.

That logic makes no sense lol you have to have something / someone who knows the code to verify whether or not you're correct..

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That logic makes no sense lol you have to have something / someone who knows the code to verify whether or not you're correct..

Unless the key you come up with for a WW-II dead pigeon's leg letter reads: "Attack London - Signed Adolf" - I would say you could be pretty sure you cracked it then ;)

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Here's the full paper. What does NURP 40 TW 194 and below mean.

Maybe latitude and longitude ?

A grid map location ?

A particular location where the message was sent, what the message refers to, or where to bomb.

And I wonder did the pigeon die before take-off, or after arriving 'home' ....

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