The Code Book: The Science of Secrecy from Ancient Egypt to Quantum Cryptography

With the advent of digital technology, widespread access to cryptography became necessary. The tension in the modern age is between the vast majority of people who will use this technology in an acceptable and law-abiding way to live their lives and the few who would use it for nefarious purposes: “As well as protecting the communications of law-abiding citizens, encryption also protects the communications of criminals and terrorists” (393). With digital communication, the task of intercepting messages has become exponentially easier, and with this development, the task of keeping limits on its use is far more important.

The technology needs to be permissible for legitimate needs while simultaneously allowing for law enforcement to catch criminals. It also needs to be regulated to keep government oversight from overstepping its bounds. Phil Zimmerman was one of the men at the forefront of keeping cryptological technology both within its proper bounds and within reach of the average person. Zimmerman developed a system that used a combination of asymmetric and symmetric encryption and that operated within an interface that would allow the average person to use it without any real knowledge of how the technology worked. He called it “Pretty Good Privacy, or PGP for short” (397).