Cryptographers Solve Zodiac Killer's "340 Cipher"
MadTinfoilHatter writes:
In November 1969 a 340 character long encrypted message was sent in a letter to the San Fransisco Chronicle. It appeared to have been sent by an already-infamous serial killer, popularly going by the name Zodiac killer. The cipher proved to be a very hard nut to crack, and the solution eluded cryptanalysts for over 50 years. On December 3rd three code breakers finally solved the mystery and here they tell us how.
Cryptographers Solve Zodiac Killer's "340 Cipher"takyon writes:
Zodiac '340 Cipher' cracked by code experts 51 years after it was sent to the S.F. Chronicle
The solution to what's known as the 340 Cipher, one of the most vexing mysteries of the Zodiac Killer's murderous saga, has been found by a code-breaking team from the United States, Australia and Belgium.
The cipher, sent in a letter to The Chronicle in November 1969, has been puzzling authorities and amateur sleuths since it arrived 51 years ago. Investigators hoped the Zodiac, who killed five people in the Bay Area in 1968 and 1969, would reveal his name in one of his many ciphers, but there is no such name in the 340.
[...] The solution to the 340 Cipher, according to Oranchak's team:
I HOPE YOU ARE HAVING LOTS OF FUN IN TRYING TO CATCH ME THAT WASNT ME ON THE TV SHOW WHICH BRINGS UP A POINT ABOUT ME I AM NOT AFRAID OF THE GAS CHAMBER BECAUSE IT WILL SEND ME TO PARADICE ALL THE SOONER BECAUSE I NOW HAVE ENOUGH SLAVES TO WORK FOR ME WHERE EVERYONE ELSE HAS NOTHING WHEN THEY REACH PARADICE SO THEY ARE AFRAID OF DEATH I AM NOT AFRAID BECAUSE I KNOW THAT MY NEW LIFE IS LIFE WILL BE AN EASY ONE IN PARADICE DEATHTo see a video about cracking the code, go to: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1oQLPRE21o [13m2s]
Oranchak's findings started leaking out on some of the many Zodiac amateur sleuth forums, such as zodiackillersite.com, over the past couple of days, causing much excitement in that widespread world of true-crime buffs.
In most ciphers, like the 408, the solution consists mainly of figuring out which letters are represented by certain symbols. In the 340 Cipher, it turned out the alignment of the words runs diagonally down the page, and occasionally they get shifted over a column.
It's a complicated bit of code creation, Oranchak said, but a basic scheme for it can be found in at least one U.S. Army code manual from the 1950s.
Also at CBS News.
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