Kryptos on the grounds of the Central Intelligence Agency in Langley, Virginia (U.S. Government image).

Kryptos is the name of a sculpture by American artist James Sanborn located on the grounds of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in Langley, Virginia, in the United States. Since its dedication on November 3, 1990, there has been much speculation about the meaning of the encrypted messages it bears. It continues to provide a diversion for employees of the CIA and other cryptanalysts attempting to decrypt the messages. The sculpture Kryptos on the grounds of the Central Intelligence Agency headquarters in Langley, Virginia. ... The sculpture Kryptos on the grounds of the Central Intelligence Agency headquarters in Langley, Virginia. ... An Italian Futurist sculpture by Umberto Boccioni at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City (MoMA). ... James Sanborn (born 1945 in Washington, D.C.) is an American sculptor. ... The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) is an intelligence agency of the United States Government. ... Langley is an unincorporated community in the census-designated place of McLean in Fairfax County, Virginia, United States. ... Official language(s) English Capital Richmond Largest city Virginia Beach Area  Ranked 35th  - Total 42,793 sq mi (110,862 km²)  - Width 200 miles (320 km)  - Length 430 miles (690 km)  - % water 7. ... November 3 is the 307th day of the year (308th in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar, with 58 days remaining. ... This article is about the year. ... The German Lorenz cipher machine, used in World War II for encryption of very high-level general staff messages Cryptography (or cryptology; derived from Greek κρυπτός kryptós hidden, and γράφειν gráfein to write) is the study of message secrecy. ... Cryptanalysis (from the Greek kryptós, hidden, and analýein, to loosen or to untie) is the study of methods for obtaining the meaning of encrypted information without access to the secret information which is normally required to do so. ...

Description

The main sculpture is made of red granite, red and green slate, white quartz, petrified wood, lodestone and copper, and is located in the northwest corner of the New Headquarters Building courtyard, outside of the Agency cafeteria. Quarrying granite for the Mormon Temple, Utah Territory. ... Slate Slate is a fine-grained, homogeneous, metamorphic rock derived from an original sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low grade regional metamorphism. ... Quartz is amongst one of the most common minerals in the Earths continental crust. ... Petrified log at the Petrified Forest National Park A petrified tree from California Petrified wood is a type of fossil, in which the tissues of a dead plant are replaced with minerals (most often a silicate, such as quartz). ... Magnetite Lodestone or loadstone refers to either: Magnetite, a magnetic mineral form of iron(II), iron(III) oxide Fe3O4, one of several iron oxides. ... General Name, Symbol, Number copper, Cu, 29 Chemical series transition metals Group, Period, Block 11, 4, d Appearance metallic pinkish red Atomic mass 63. ...

The name Kryptos comes from the Greek word for "hidden", and the theme of the sculpture is "intelligence gathering." The most prominent feature is a large vertical S-shaped copper screen resembling a scroll, or piece of paper emerging from a computer printer, covered with characters comprising encrypted text. The characters consist of the 26 letters of the standard alphabet and question marks cut out of the copper. This "inscription" contains four separate enigmatic messages, each apparently encrypted with a different cipher. This article is about algorithms for encryption and decryption. ...

At the same time as the main sculpture was installed, sculptor Sanborn also placed several other pieces around CIA grounds, such as several large granite slabs with sandwiched copper sheets outside the entrance to the New Headquarters Building. Several morse code messages are engraved in the copper, and one of the slabs has an engraved compass rose. Other elements of Sanborn's installation include a landscaped area, a duck pond, and several other seemingly unmarked slabs. James Sanborn (born 1945 in Washington, D.C.) is an American sculptor. ... The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) is an intelligence agency of the United States Government. ...

Encrypted messages

The ciphertext on one half of the main sculpture contains 865 characters in total. The other half of the sculpture comprises a Vigenère encryption tableau. Sanborn worked with a retiring CIA employee named Ed Scheidt, Chairman of the CIA Cryptographic Center, to come up with the cryptographic systems used on the sculpture. Sanborn has since revealed that the sculpture contains a riddle within a riddle which will be solvable only after the four encrypted passages have been decrypted. He said that he gave the complete solution at the time of the sculpture's dedication to CIA director William H. Webster. However, in an interview for wired.com in January 2005, Sanborn said that he had not given Webster the entire solution. He did, however, confirm that where in part 2 it says "Who knows the exact location? Only WW," that "WW" was intended to refer to William Webster. The Vigenère cipher is named for Blaise de Vigenère (pictured), although Giovan Batista Belaso had invented the cipher earlier. ... Edward M. Scheidt is the retired Chairman of the CIA Cryptographic Center, and the designer of the cryptographic systems on the Kryptos sculpture at the center of CIA Headquarters in Langley, Virginia. ... William Hedgcock Webster (born March 6, 1924) was the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) from 1978 to 1987 and director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) from 1987 to 1991. ...

Solvers

The first person to publicly announce solving the first three sections, in 1999, was James Gillogly, a computer scientist from southern California, who deciphered 768 of the characters. The portion that he couldn't solve, the remaining 97 or 98 characters, is the same part which has stumped the government's own cryptanalysts. After Gillogly's announcement, the CIA revealed that their analyst David Stein had also solved the same sections in 1998, using pencil and paper techniques, though at the time of his solution the information was only disseminated within the intelligence community, and no public announcement was made. The NSA also claimed at that time that they had solvers, but would not reveal names or dates until 2005, when it was learned that an NSA team led by Ken Miller, along with Dennis McDaniels and two other unnamed individuals, had solved parts 1-3 using a computer in late 1992, but that they too had been stumped by the fourth section. James J. Gillogly is an American computer scientist and cryptographer. ... Computer science (informally: CS or compsci) is, in its most general sense, the study of computation and information processing, both in hardware and in software. ... This article is becoming very long. ... The National Security Agency/Central Security Service (NSA/CSS) is believed to be the largest United States government intelligence gathering agency. ... The National Security Agency/Central Security Service (NSA/CSS) is believed to be the largest United States government intelligence gathering agency. ...

2006 clarification

On April 19, 2006, Sanborn contacted the Kryptos Group (an online community dedicated to the Kryptos puzzle) to inform them that the accepted solution to part 2 was wrong. He had removed a single character from the cyphertext for aesthetic reasons. An accidental result of this change was that plaintext that should have decoded as "XLAYERTWO" had been decoded as "IDBYROWS". April 19 is the 109th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (110th in leap years). ... 2006 (MMVI) is a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

The impact of this change on attempts to solve part 4 is not currently known. Sanborn has implied that there may be a connection, as solvers "were in fact, missing a clue".^[1]

Related sculptures

Kryptos is the first cryptographic sculpture made by Sanborn. After Kryptos, however, he went on to make several other sculptures with codes and other types of writing, including one called Antipodes which is at the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington, D.C., an "Untitled Kryptos Piece" which was sold to a private collector, and a Cyrillic Projector with encrypted Russian text, which included an extract from a classified KGB document. The cipher on one side of Antipodes repeats the text from CIA's Kryptos. The cipher on its Russian side is duplicated on the Cyrillic Projector. The Russian portion of the cipher on the Cyrillic Projector and Antipodes was solved in 2003 via an international effort organized by Elonka Dunin, with the cryptographic component independently cracked by Frank Corr and Mike Bales.^[2][3] Categories: Museum stubs | Museums in Washington, DC | Art museums and galleries in the U.S. | Smithsonian Institution | National Mall ... The Cyrillic Projector is a sculpture created by American artist James Sanborn in the early 1990s, and was purchased by the University of North Carolina at Charlotte in 1997. ... The KGB emblem and motto: The sword and the shield KGB (transliteration of КГБ) is the Russian-language abbreviation for Committee for State Security, (Russian:  ; Komitet Gosudarstvennoj Bezopasnosti). ... Elonka Dunin Elonka Dunin is a game developer and amateur cryptographer. ...

Pop culture references

The dust jacket of the US version of Dan Brown's novel The Da Vinci Code contains two references to Kryptos: One on the back cover (coordinates printed light red on dark red, vertically next to the blurbs) is a reference to the coordinates mentioned in the plaintext of part 2 (see below), except the degrees digit is off by one. When Brown and his publisher were asked about this, they both gave the same reply: "The discrepancy is intentional." The other reference is hidden in the brown "tear" artwork—upside-down words which say "Only WW knows." These are another reference to Kryptos Part 2.^[4] Dan Brown (born June 22, 1964) is an American author of thriller fiction, best known for writing the controversial 2003 bestselling novel, The Da Vinci Code. ... This article is about the novel. ...

A small version of the Kryptos appears in the season 5 episode of Alias, "S.O.S.". In it, Marshall Flinkman, in a small moment of comic relief, says he has cracked the code just by looking at it during a tour visit to the Central Intelligence Agency office. The solution he describes sounds like the solution to the first two parts. Alias was an American Spy-fi television series created by J. J. Abrams that aired on ABC from September 30, 2001 to May 22, 2006. ... This article contains episode summaries as well as directing and writing credits from the fifth and final season of the American drama/adventure television series Alias. ...

Solutions

The following are the solutions of parts 1-3 of the sculpture.^[5][6] Misspellings present in the code are included as-is. Kryptos K1 and K2 ciphers are polyalphabetic substitution, using a Vigenere Tableau similar to the tableau on the other half of the sculpture. K3 is a transposition cipher, and K4 is yet unsolved. The Vigenère cipher is named for Blaise de Vigenère (pictured), although Giovan Batista Belaso had invented the cipher earlier. ... In classical cryptography, a transposition cipher changes one character from the plaintext to another (to decrypt the reverse is done). ...

Solution 1

Keywords: Kryptos, Palimpsest A palimpsest is a manuscript page, scroll, or book that has been written on, scraped off, and used again. ...

BETWEEN SUBTLE SHADING AND THE ABSENCE OF LIGHT LIES THE NUANCE OF IQLUSION

Solution 2

Keywords: Kryptos, Abscissa Abscissa means the x coordinate on an (x, y) graph; the input of a mathematical function against which the output is plotted. ...

IT WAS TOTALLY INVISIBLE HOWS THAT POSSIBLE ? THEY USED THE EARTHS MAGNETIC FIELD X THE INFORMATION WAS GATHERED AND TRANSMITTED UNDERGRUUND TO AN UNKNOWN LOCATION X DOES LANGLEY KNOW ABOUT THIS ? THEY SHOULD ITS BURIED OUT THERE SOMEWHERE X WHO KNOWS THE EXACT LOCATION ? ONLY WW THIS WAS HIS LAST MESSAGE X THIRTY EIGHT DEGREES FIFTY SEVEN MINUTES SIX POINT FIVE SECONDS NORTH SEVENTY SEVEN DEGREES EIGHT MINUTES FORTY FOUR SECONDS WEST X LAYER TWO

In April 2006 Sanborn said that he made an error in the sculpture by omitting an "X" used to indicate a break for aesthetic reasons, and that the decrypted text which ended "...FOUR SECONDS WEST ID BY ROW S" should actually be "...FOUR SECONDS WEST X LAYER TWO".^[7]

Note:The coordinates mentioned in the plaintext: 38°57′6.5″N, 77°8′44″W; on Google Maps; analysis of the cited location. The point is about 200 feet south of the sculpture itself.

Solution 3

SLOWLY DESPARATLY SLOWLY THE REMAINS OF PASSAGE DEBRIS THAT ENCUMBERED THE LOWER PART OF THE DOORWAY WAS REMOVED WITH TREMBLING HANDS I MADE A TINY BREACH IN THE UPPER LEFT HAND CORNER AND THEN WIDENING THE HOLE A LITTLE I INSERTED THE CANDLE AND PEERED IN THE HOT AIR ESCAPING FROM THE CHAMBER CAUSED THE FLAME TO FLICKER BUT PRESENTLY DETAILS OF THE ROOM WITHIN EMERGED FROM THE MIST X CAN YOU SEE ANYTHING Q (?)

This is a paraphrased and misspelled quotation from Howard Carter's account of the opening of the tomb of Tutankhamun in his 1923 book The Tomb of Tutankhamun. The question with which it ends is that posed by Lord Carnarvon, to which Carter (in the book) famously replied "wonderful things". In the actual November 26, 1922 field notes, his reply was, "Yes, it is wonderful."^[8] Plate LXXA shows detail on a ceremonial walking staff found buried with Tutankhamun; it depicts the two foes, or the Northern and Southern enemies of Egypt. ... Nebkheperure Lord of the forms of Re Nomen Tutankhaten Living Image of the Aten Tutankhamun Hekaiunushema Living Image of Amun, ruler of Upper Heliopolis Horus name Kanakht Tutmesut The strong bull, pleasing of birth Nebty name Neferhepusegerehtawy One of perfect laws, who pacifies the two lands [1] Golden Horus Wetjeskhausehetepnetjeru... Lord Carnarvon (right) with Howard Carter, who was chief archeologist on many of Carnarvons excavations. ... November 26 is the 330th day (331st on leap years) of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... 1922 (MCMXXII) was a common year starting on Sunday (see link for calendar). ...

Solution 4

Part 4 remains publicly unsolved.

Notes

1. ^ Typo Confounds Kryptos Sleuths
2. ^ Woman sets sights on code on CIA sculpture
3. ^ Cyrillic Riddle Solved
4. ^ FAQ About Kryptos
5. ^ Kryptos: The Sanborn Sculpture at CIA Headquarters
6. ^ Cypherpunk breaks CIA's crypto code in 1990 statue
7. ^ The Kryptos Group announces a corrected answer to Kryptos Part 2
8. ^ Tutankhamun: Anatomy of an Excavation

References

Books

• Jonathan Binstock and Jim Sanborn, Atomic Time: Pure Science and Seduction, 2003. ISBN 0-88675-072-5 (contains 1-2 pages about Kryptos)
• Elonka Dunin, The Mammoth Book of Secret Codes and Cryptograms, 2006. ISBN 0-7867-1726-2

Elonka Dunin Elonka Dunin is a game developer and amateur cryptographer. ...

Articles

• CIA website on Kryptos
• "CIA's Artistic Enigma Reveals All but Final Clues", June 16, 1999, New York Times
• "Cracking the Code of a CIA Sculpture", July 19, 1999, Washington Post
• "Gillogly Cracks CIA Art", & "The Kryptos Code Unmasked", 1999, New York Times and Cypherpunks archive
• "Unlocking the secret of Kryptos", March 17, 2000, Sun Journal
• "Solving the Enigma of Kryptos", January 26, 2005, Wired, by Kim Zetter
• "CIA sculpture 'kryptos' draws mystery lovers", May 27, 2005, Wall Street Journal
• "Interest grows in solving cryptic CIA puzzle after link to Da Vinci Code", June 11, 2005, The Guardian
• "Cracking the Code", June 19, 2005, CNN
• "Typo Confounds Kryptos Sleuths", April 20, 2006 Wired, by Kim Zetter

... The New York Times is an internationally known daily newspaper published in New York City and distributed in the United States and many other nations worldwide. ... The cypherpunks comprise an informal group of people interested in privacy and cryptography who originally communicated through the cypherpunks mailing list. ... Wired is a full-color monthly magazine and on-line periodical published in San Francisco, California since March 1993. ... Kim Zetter in the 2004 documentary Invisible Ballots Kim Zetter is an American freelance journalist in Oakland, California. ... The Wall Street Journal is an influential international daily newspaper published in New York City, New York with an average daily circulation of 1,800,607 (2002). ... The Guardian is a British newspaper owned by the Guardian Media Group. ... The Cable News Network, commonly known as CNN, is a major cable television network founded in 1980 by Ted Turner. ... Wired is a full-color monthly magazine and on-line periodical published in San Francisco, California since March 1993. ... Kim Zetter in the 2004 documentary Invisible Ballots Kim Zetter is an American freelance journalist in Oakland, California. ...

External links

• Kryptos website maintained by Elonka Dunin (includes Kryptos FAQ, transcript, pictures and further links)
• Decryption of sections 1 and 2, written by Bill Houck
• John Wilson's Kryptos page (lots of info and links)
• Patrick Foster's Kryptos page
• Gary Phillips' Kryptos page (animated solutions and Kryptos resources)
• Richard Gay's Kryptos pages
• Kryptos photos by Jim Gillogly
• Monet's Kryptos Observations

Elonka Dunin Elonka Dunin is a game developer and amateur cryptographer. ... James J. Gillogly is an American computer scientist and cryptographer. ...

Aerial photos of Kryptos location

• Terraserver-USA
• Google Maps
• The location referred to in the part 2 cleartext (Google Maps) - approximately 150 feet southeast of the Kryptos sculpture.