media consumption

The Code Book

Did you know that Mary Queen of Scots was beheaded because of a letter she wrote that detailed a plot to assassinate Queen Elizabeth I? Mary was brought down because the secret code she used was broken by Elizabeth's cryptographer. Elizabeth could read every word and tricked Mary into revealing her accomplices by using the same code to alter the return letter.

You'll learn this and many other historical tidbits in Simon Singh's The Code Book: The Science of Secrecy from Ancient Egypt to Quantum Cryptography, This book is an excellent introduction into the world of cryptography and the competing science, cryptanalysis. Singh's writing style is open and lucid, very accessible to the lay reader. I picked this up after breezing through my third read of Cryptonomicon, curious to learn more of the history of cryptography.

I'm only three chapters in and what I'm fascinated to learn just how important secrecy and espionage have been throughout history. Spying didn't start with the CIA. People have been reading each other's mail for centuries. This book lays out several examples as Mr. Singh charts the constant and seemingly endless battle between codewriters and codebreakers. If you share my curiosity with cryptography, this is a great place to start.

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