Cryptography 101!

[Trivun]

O'S YZGXZOTM UAZ COZN G XKGRRE KGYE UTK NKXK. ZNK IRAK LUX ZNOY IUJK OY OT ZNK TASHKX UL RKZZKXY OT SE AYKXTGSK...

A most imperial clue is in my username

I have something of an interest in cryptography - when I was at school I started entering each year (alongside a team of fellow students) the UK's National Cipher Challenge, run by the University of Southampton. I never did very well, since the challenges each week start out easy and start to get a lot more complex over time, but it was always good fun. Now I want to delve deeper into the history of cryptography, and learn how ciphers and codes have developed as well as build up my skills in actually deciphering messages.

So, this thread is for people to post their own ciphers and codes, and challenge the Escapist community to solve them! I'll be adding messages every so often myself, to see who can decipher them, and I want to see everyone adding their own messages to be unlocked - the fun isn't in the message, but the type of cipher used! The first challenge is above, and it's a pretty easy one to begin with, but I do intend them to get harder .

(answers in spoiler tags please, so as not to ruin it for people)

 

[SweetShark]

I will admit I am not into this things, but I have a question about something similar:

Do you know about a condition which your brain automatically can read a mess up text?
At first you clearly see that the text in front of you is a a big mess of random letters.
However because it is a very unique type of text, it is not actually random words. They are are specifically arranged like that, so our Brain can read somehow the text after few tries.

I saw this type of text on Facebook one day and i get very surprise I could read it.

Do you know the name of it please?

EDIT: Yes, it seems I found it after all. Please read the example below to see what I mean:

Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.

Cool power of the mind yo.

 

[Extra-Ordinary]

Spoiler

O'S YZGXZOTM UAZ COZN G XKGRRE KGYE UTK NKXK. ZNK IRAK LUX ZNOY IUJK OY OT ZNK TASHKX UL RKZZKXY OT SE AYKXTGSK...

I'M STARTING OUT WITH A REALLY EASY ONE HERE. THE CLUE FOR THIS CODE IS IN THE NUMBER OF LETTERS IN MY USERNAME...

Six
A -> G

Well, I'm glad you find these things easy, took me a while.
There was a brief stint in my life when I really liked crackin' codes, really nothing heavy duty or even close but it was good times, not enough books or games with casual code-cracking I think but maybe I'm not looking hard enough.
Real quick, what's the point of putting a clue for the code into the solved message if we have to solve it first to even read it?

 

[Trivun]

Spoiler

O'S YZGXZOTM UAZ COZN G XKGRRE KGYE UTK NKXK. ZNK IRAK LUX ZNOY IUJK OY OT ZNK TASHKX UL RKZZKXY OT SE AYKXTGSK...

I'M STARTING OUT WITH A REALLY EASY ONE HERE. THE CLUE FOR THIS CODE IS IN THE NUMBER OF LETTERS IN MY USERNAME...

Six
A -> G

Well, I'm glad you find these things easy, took me a while.
There was a brief stint in my life when I really liked crackin' codes, really nothing heavy duty or even close but it was good times, not enough books or games with casual code-cracking I think but maybe I'm not looking hard enough.
Real quick, what's the point of putting a clue for the code into the solved message if we have to solve it first to even read it?

Just a little joke on my part really, I wanted to see how long it took someone to solve without the clue . I'll amend it now so the clue is more clear.

To be fair, this particular cipher is one of the easier ones out there, provided you know what you're looking for (obviously I'm not counting things like Morse Code, pigpen, pig latin, etc. in that). I mentioned the National Cipher Challenge in the opening post, this method is actually the very first one they always start with, then move on to more difficult types of code for later puzzles (mostly substitution though since they're, at least in my experience, generally more difficult to solve than transposition).

 

[Fallow]

Q29udmVydGluZyB0ZXh0IHRvIGJhc2U2NCBpc24ndCByZWFsbHkgYW4gJ2VuY3J5cHRpb24nIHBl
ciBzZSwgYnV0IGl0J3MgYmV0dGVyIHRoYW4gdGhlIGRvdWJsZSBDYWVzYXIgeW91IHN0YXJ0ZWQg
d2l0aAo=

Pretty simple one.

 

[Extra-Ordinary]

Just a little joke on my part really, I wanted to see how long it took someone to solve without the clue . I'll amend it now so the clue is more clear.

To be fair, this particular cipher is one of the easier ones out there, provided you know what you're looking for (obviously I'm not counting things like Morse Code, pigpen, pig latin, etc. in that). I mentioned the National Cipher Challenge in the opening post, this method is actually the very first one they always start with, then move on to more difficult types of code for later puzzles (mostly substitution though since they're, at least in my experience, generally more difficult to solve than transposition).

Yep, you're talkin' right over me, I'm a filthy casual, I might check out when we get to that stuff, whatever it means.

Q29udmVydGluZyB0ZXh0IHRvIGJhc2U2NCBpc24ndCByZWFsbHkgYW4gJ2VuY3J5cHRpb24nIHBl
ciBzZSwgYnV0IGl0J3MgYmV0dGVyIHRoYW4gdGhlIGRvdWJsZSBDYWVzYXIgeW91IHN0YXJ0ZWQg
d2l0aAo=

Pretty simple one.

Or now.
"Simple"
I can't tell if you're serious or not but if you are, already to smart for my blood.

 

[Fallow]

[

Q29udmVydGluZyB0ZXh0IHRvIGJhc2U2NCBpc24ndCByZWFsbHkgYW4gJ2VuY3J5cHRpb24nIHBl
ciBzZSwgYnV0IGl0J3MgYmV0dGVyIHRoYW4gdGhlIGRvdWJsZSBDYWVzYXIgeW91IHN0YXJ0ZWQg
d2l0aAo=

Pretty simple one.

Or now.
"Simple"
I can't tell if you're serious or not but if you are, already to smart for my blood.

The characters in the string indicate that the operation is not over the alphabet, but something like ascii. There is no key, meaning it's a static shift. That leaves only a few options readily available, and only the simple ones are of interest. If you need keys you've gone too far.

 

[FalloutJack]

Funny, when I usually see writing like this, it's because somebody's cat just walked across their keyboard.

 

[Extra-Ordinary]

The characters in the string indicate that the operation is not over the alphabet, but something like ascii. There is no key, meaning it's a static shift. That leaves only a few options readily available, and only the simple ones are of interest. If you need keys you've gone too far.

Call me an idiot, I still don't get it.
I didn't know what ascii was until I just now looked it up to see what it was, I don't understand what you mean by key or no key or what "static shift" means, I just really don't get it.
I know I'm practically asking for the solution so please PM me or put it in a spoiler-box because I'd really like to know how this one comes together.

 

[FPLOON]

GJFADPKXLQBOQBOCWNYSZTMAHWYESJDRKGEMZVDCOXBLSGUPATWQICJOKMNXYZ!

I don't know what the fuck I'm doing... Uh... Third house from the left? Two spaces? One answer?

 

[MysticSlayer]

Q29udmVydGluZyB0ZXh0IHRvIGJhc2U2NCBpc24ndCByZWFsbHkgYW4gJ2VuY3J5cHRpb24nIHBl
ciBzZSwgYnV0IGl0J3MgYmV0dGVyIHRoYW4gdGhlIGRvdWJsZSBDYWVzYXIgeW91IHN0YXJ0ZWQg
d2l0aAo=

Pretty simple one.

Spoiler

Converting text to base64 isn't really an 'encryption' per se, but it's better than the double Caesar you started with

 

[MysticSlayer]

Or now.
"Simple"
I can't tell if you're serious or not but if you are, already to smart for my blood.

It is simple for those who know what they're looking at. It probably isn't so simple otherwise.

 

[Trivun]

Q29udmVydGluZyB0ZXh0IHRvIGJhc2U2NCBpc24ndCByZWFsbHkgYW4gJ2VuY3J5cHRpb24nIHBl
ciBzZSwgYnV0IGl0J3MgYmV0dGVyIHRoYW4gdGhlIGRvdWJsZSBDYWVzYXIgeW91IHN0YXJ0ZWQg
d2l0aAo=

Pretty simple one.

That's actually pretty good.

Spoiler

I figured it would have something to do with bases, but for whatever reason I was imagining base 32 or 36. I've rarely come across ciphers using ASCII before, although they are common enough, so it threw me for a loop for a moment.

 

[Fallow]

This is an old and very classic encryption:

FFQJQYXOTKXQKZZULQNEEWYBPOKGYJRGTTDVQQFWVYXOWKRDVSGDGMOLFLOCQULDYAMPKSHWFCPGBSMJMMBQCVSDUTTWZAMQVCWEWAIFKRRAQPQSIKBMSUKCMOFEHKZCFCXLSQNSULEYTGTESCFVMQNTYWSPWDOYNPVZRZVYPFVDBAYRZHZXIYEBWDHOAXKDQCKYVTZAZBUMINROXAMGUNZPWLAKTWWHYS

If you need help, consider MYMOISTBUTTOCKSQUIVERINYOURLUSTYGAZE

 

[Trivun]

This is an old and very classic encryption:

FFQJQYXOTKXQKZZULQNEEWYBPOKGYJRGTTDVQQFWVYXOWKRDVSGDGMOLFLOCQULDYAMPKSHWFCPGBSMJMMBQCVSDUTTWZAMQVCWEWAIFKRRAQPQSIKBMSUKCMOFEHKZCFCXLSQNSULEYTGTESCFVMQNTYWSPWDOYNPVZRZVYPFVDBAYRZHZXIYEBWDHOAXKDQCKYVTZAZBUMINROXAMGUNZPWLAKTWWHYS

If you need help, consider MYMOISTBUTTOCKSQUIVERINYOURLUSTYGAZE

Spoiler

Vignere cipher, quite a tricky one unless you have the key phrase - which of course, we did...

The Vigenere cipher is an old but very interesting encryption method because it resisted statistical analysis - shift ciphers were easily broken once you knew what language they used, but with a variable shift that was no longer possible without additional knowledge.

 

[Fallow]

3e b4 41 02 3e b1 53 d6 45 98 1e 12 b7 b8 8d c5
07 7c 6e 43 7b 73 fa cf e4 72 01 a7 8a 58 13 2e
e5 08 b6 e0 0e 15 20 7f 9d 1f 1f de b4 4c 5a f8
2e 6d bd d6 b9 1e ce 66 51 f3 05 59 c7 83 21 49
e2 f3 ad b9 ee 8b 3d 7a 9e 5c 43 48 38 6e ea 46
b7 1b 1f 2f 91 c4 57 37 9c 72 b8 23 07 2a 24 0d
16 68 94 5c 5d f4 56 e3 9b f3 1f 1c e3 27 36 25
c7 33 48 e7 1c 80 3e f4 bb 56 fd ee 61 29 d2 85
93 56 9f ab f1 96 5a f5 51 c0 09 20 c3 57 7c e2
68 ae 16 db 6b 5d ff 40 bb 0b eb 44 d9 66 3f 30
ce b4 b5 2a d5 b8 ec 47 f1 d0 e0 92 d8 00 6e 5f
d3 64 d1 3f ff e1 6e cb 11 9a e1 11 f9 b4 ba 33
6e 2f ad 48 10 84 2b 86 83 d3 96 f0 29 fc c1 6a
fb 43 3c 71 00 1b 10 80 e0 f3 9a 53 f8 5a bd af
11 bc 63 14 1b ca eb de 28 9a 36 44 4b ce c5 5b

To spice things up, and to make things a little more interesting, there is a single character missing from the key 'TheSlyFoxGentlySpanks'

I do not recommend you do this one by hand.

EDIT: To make it easier, the table is hexadecimal and the missing character is at the end of the key. If you get it wrong, you can expect increasing drift in the plaintext.