Simple Transposition

History

The exact origins and early usage of simple transposition ciphers are not well-documented. However, it is known that they were employed by various civilizations throughout history. For example, the Spartan military used a form of transposition cipher known as the Scytale during the 5th century BC.

Simple transposition ciphers gained prominence during times of conflict and war when secure communication was vital. They offered a relatively straightforward method of obfuscating the message structure, making it more challenging for adversaries to decipher the information.

With the advancement of cryptography and the introduction of more complex encryption methods, simple transposition ciphers became less secure. However, they continue to be studied today as an essential part of the historical development of cryptographic techniques.

Some quotes from online:

“Transposition Ciphers are a bit different to Substitution Ciphers. Whereas Substitution ciphers replace each letter with a different letter or symbol to produce the ciphertext, in a Transposition cipher, the letters are just moved around”.

“One example of a transposition cipher, is to reverse the order of the letters in a plaintext. So "a simple example" becomes "ELPMAXE ELPMIS A"”.

How it works

Simple transposition cipher is arguably the simplest cipher to solve (in this game). To encrypt a sentence/plaintext using simple transposition cipher, simply write the letters in the plaintext in reverse. Let’s take the example “today is a sunny day” and reverse all the letters, which gives the cyphertext “yad ynnus a si yadot”:

The spaces between words/letters are maintained.

Deciphering a simple transposition cipher is thus also quite simple, since you once again reverse all the letters in the cyphertext, maintaining the spaces. Deciphering the cyphertext “yad ynnus a si yadot” can be done simple by reading the cyphertext “backwards”, hence we get back the plaintext “today is a sunny day”:

How it works (in the game)

In the User vs Computer game mode, decrypting the cyphertext is as simple as reverse all the letters in the sentence.

Here the cyphertext “dne eht si siht” when reversed gives the plaintext “this is the end”.

Note: in the game, the answer box will accept the plaintext even if spaces are not maintained. So for the example cyphertext "DNE EHT SI SIHT", the plaintext "this is the end" that can be written as "thisistheend", "this isthe end", "thi sisth eend", etc. The system will automatically remove spacing from your answer, so don't feel pressed in the game if spaces aren't maintained. Although you may end up using anyway to make sure you can read the sentence.