Break the WWII pigeon code for bitcoin

[Micon]

http://www.cnn.com/2012/11/23/world/europe/uk-wwii-pigeon-mystery/index.html

Why can't anyone break this code?  they claim it might have involved a "one time pad"

uh... can't we super-compute the code on out of there real quick?

would be cool if bitcoiners did it... would get the community very positive attention.  Preferably a female cryptographer or a young kid.  That would be perfect for the media. We just *have* to have bad-ass cryptography experts combing these forums... (I am not one of them)

[1715292442]

1715292442

[1715292442]

1715292442

[1715292442]

1715292442

[jim618]

One time pads are similar to XORing a pre agreed random text with your message text to create cipher text.
If you do not have the pre agreed random text they are unbreakable.

Given some one time pad cipher text you can 'decode' it to any message you like of the same length by preparing the random text to XOR it with.

According to Wikipedia they were known about in 1882 so would have been in common use in WWII.

[greyhawk]

(I am not one of them)

That is very very obvious. Breaking a true OTP encrypted message is mathematically impossible no matter how much computer effort you throw at it.

[Remember remember the 5th of November]

Looks like a serial key to me.

[greyhawk]

Looks like a serial key to me.

Put it in Steam and see if it's viral marketing for a game. 

[Phinnaeus Gage]

AOAKN HVPKD FNFJW YIDDC
RQXSR DJHFP GOVFN MIAPX
PABUZ WYYNP CMPNW HJRZH
NLXKG MEMKK ONOIB AKEEQ
WAOTA RBQRH DJOFM TPZEH
LKXGH RGGHT JRZCQ FNKTQ
KLDTS FQIRW AOAKN 27 1525/6

I'm almost certain this was a time traveler carrier pigeon. MIAPX = Matthews Asia Growth Fund

For S&G, I searched DYKEG and foung the following: http://thenextweb.com/insider/2012/11/23/after-weeks-of-trying-uk-cryptographers-fail-to-crack-world-war-ii-code-found-on-dead-pigeon/

Kris  Massively • 3 days ago −

No, he is right, there are 27 groups. All he missed is what the /6 represented. Use the "DD" "YY" "KK" "EE" "GG" as line delimiters, string the groups together to make a line and you get 6 lines total, results in:

AOAKN

HVPKDFNFJWYI D
D CRQXSRDJHFPGOVFNMIAPXPABUZW Y
Y NPCMPNWHJRZHNLXKGMEM K
K ONOIBAK E
E QWAOTARBQRHDJOFMTPZEHLKXGHR G
G HTJRZCQFNKTQKLDTSFQIRW

AOAKN 27 1525/6

AOAKN could perhaps be combined with DYKEG somehow for the cipher...

I'm going to ask Maria to work on this with her ASICs.

[greyhawk]

K ONOIBAK E

That's interesting. Wasn't the pigeon found in a chimney?

Let's play with that string a bit.

O NO I BAKE

I think you're on to something.

[Micon]

If listening to MC Front-a-lot's Defcon 2012 "Secrets of the Future" more than twice I feel I am now qualified to comment on one-time pads. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZP8VghUuX7M

Maybe it's just this stupid human brain in my head, but I sort of refuse to accept


AOAKN HVPKD FNFJW YIDDC
RQXSR DJHFP GOVFN MIAPX
PABUZ WYYNP CMPNW HJRZH
NLXKG MEMKK ONOIB AKEEQ
WAOTA RBQRH DJOFM TPZEH
LKXGH RGGHT JRZCQ FNKTQ
KLDTS FQIRW AOAKN 27 1525/6


that is totally unhackable.  It will likely need a savvy human or 2 with the aid of a savvy computer or 2 and try and bunch of top-level shit that the computers can churn on for a hot minute.  I.e. first test that makes sense to me is "what if those 5 letter groupings each represent one letter or number"  code the nuts out of a program to try many different odd ways to add up those letters / divide by  1 then 2 then 3 then take the last digit and match it against a decending alpha-numeric list and see if it spells "COORDINATES 12"W 67"N and try obviously a large number of schemes, a large number of iterations within each scheme... might be a cool incomplete information computing task...

and I hereby fully accept what appears to be the case here and I'm a stupid human who cannot wrap his head around 1xPad cryptography and Frontalot lied to me and said a children's speak-n-spell could crack it in 2025.

[greyhawk]

I.e. first test that makes sense to me is "what if those 5 letter groupings each represent one letter or number"  code the nuts out of a program to try many different odd ways to add up those letters / divide by  1 then 2 then 3 then take the last digit and match it against a decending alpha-numeric list and see if it spells "COORDINATES 12"W 67"N

That's exactly the beauty of One Time Pads. Without the Pad you can theoretically arrive at any plaintext you wish from the crypto text via cryptanalysis without ever knowing if the plaintext is correct or something you want it to be like

STUCK IN CHIMNEY PLEASE SEND HELP

[AndrewBUD]

Please send solvent

Glued hand to self

Please hurry


Ouch

[Phinnaeus Gage]

One thing is for sure, for being a short message, all the letters of the English alphabet are used.

~Bruno K~

[Phinnaeus Gage]

AOAKN HVPKD FNFJW YIDDC
RQXSR DJHFP GOVFN MIAPX
PABUZ WYYNP CMPNW HJRZH
NLXKG MEMKK ONOIB AKEEQ
WAOTA RBQRH DJOFM TPZEH
LKXGH RGGHT JRZCQ FNKTQ
KLDTS FQIRW AOAKN

Here's the letter distribution count:

A: 9
B: 3
C: 3
D: 6
E: 4
F: 7
G: 5
H: 8
I: 4
J: 5
K: 10
L: 3
M: 5
N: 9
O: 7
P: 7
Q: 6
R: 8
S: 2
T: 5
U: 1
V: 2
W: 5
X: 4
Y: 3
Z: 4

And the count by frequency:

K: 10

A: 9
N: 9

H: 8
R: 8

F: 7
O: 7
P: 7

D: 6
Q: 6

G: 5
J: 5
M: 5
T: 5
W: 5

E: 4
I: 4
X: 4
Z: 4

B: 3
C: 3
L: 3
Y: 3

S: 2
V: 2

U: 1

Now, it looks pretty simple to solve.

K = Contact
AN = Airborne Network (or Army/Navy)
HR = Human Resource/Relations; Hand Receipt(s); Humanitarian Relief
FOP = Flight Operations Plan
DQ = Data Quest
G = Grid           J = Jammed
MTW = Major Theater of War
EI = End Item               X = Exercise       Z = Zodiac
BCL = Battlefield Coordination Line           Y = Y-Axis (Yankee Time Zone)
SV = Sniper Variant
U = UNCLASSIFIED; Unrestricted

[Phinnaeus Gage]

My apologies, but this is an ego bump. I'm curious to read if my last post has merit. The final aspect does need a tad more polishing though, but I feel it's close.

Thanks, all.

~Bruno K~

[DarkHyudrA]

"T" could be Tank or Tiger, the so called heavy-armored tank, as P could be the Panzer?
"D" could be Division?

[yogi]

It looks enigma encrypted. But, that is to obvious and a brute force attack is likely to have already been tried.

Maybe it's a list of enigma codes?

[Phinnaeus Gage]

I think this pigeon deserves the Dickin Medal: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dickin_Medal

[DarkHyudrA]

I think this pigeon deserves the Dickin Medal: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dickin_Medal

He delivered his/her message to deserve the medal?

[caffeinewriter]

If we wanted to "super-compute" this, and it is a one time pad, you have a better chance of cracking a specific Bitcoin key-pair.

AOAKN HVPKD FNFJW YIDDC
RQXSR DJHFP GOVFN MIAPX
PABUZ WYYNP CMPNW HJRZH
NLXKG MEMKK ONOIB AKEEQ
WAOTA RBQRH DJOFM TPZEH
LKXGH RGGHT JRZCQ FNKTQ
KLDTS FQIRW AOAKN

Here's the letter distribution count:

A: 9
B: 3
C: 3
D: 6
E: 4
F: 7
G: 5
H: 8
I: 4
J: 5
K: 10
L: 3
M: 5
N: 9
O: 7
P: 7
Q: 6
R: 8
S: 2
T: 5
U: 1
V: 2
W: 5
X: 4
Y: 3
Z: 4

And the count by frequency:

K: 10

A: 9
N: 9

H: 8
R: 8

F: 7
O: 7
P: 7

D: 6
Q: 6

G: 5
J: 5
M: 5
T: 5
W: 5

E: 4
I: 4
X: 4
Z: 4

B: 3
C: 3
L: 3
Y: 3

S: 2
V: 2

U: 1

Now, it looks pretty simple to solve.

K = Contact
AN = Airborne Network (or Army/Navy)
HR = Human Resource/Relations; Hand Receipt(s); Humanitarian Relief
FOP = Flight Operations Plan
DQ = Data Quest
G = Grid           J = Jammed
MTW = Major Theater of War
EI = End Item               X = Exercise       Z = Zodiac
BCL = Battlefield Coordination Line           Y = Y-Axis (Yankee Time Zone)
SV = Sniper Variant
U = UNCLASSIFIED; Unrestricted

Quite an interesting analysis. I'd love to see the context this pigeon code was intercept in to verify your theory to see if it's viable.

[greyhawk]

It looks enigma encrypted.

No it doesn't. Enigma encrypted messages had a header like this:

[Phinnaeus Gage]

With my theory, where the letters are doubled may have no significance to the code. Also, has anybody considered if the blue ink use to pen it is relevant?