Bitcoin

After reading about Bitcoin, I was absolutely amazed.  What I found most interesting was how secretive it is.  The fact that the creator of Bitcoin is not known amazes me.  It is such a well designed program that many people say it is impossible to hack.  It also works.  People are actually using it to trade items and make purchases.  I think it will grow over the coming years and become fairly important.  I want to try using it.  Who knows, maybe I can make some money.

M-94 and Jefferson Wheel Cipher

I researched the United States Army M-94 cipher device for my final project and one thing really stood out to me.  The device was widely used during the years 1921 to 1942 but in fact, the device was actually invented over a hundred years before.  Thomas Jefferson actually invented the device in 1795 but it wasn't used until 1921.  I find it amazing that Jefferson was able to invent the device.  It just shows how much of a genius he really was. He created something that was very far ahead of his time.

PSN hacked

A few months ago, Sony's online video game network, PSN, was hacked.  An unauthorized person was able to break into the PlayStation Network and steal valuable information.  Sony admitted that credit card numbers from the over 70 million users might have been stolen.  The hacker was also able to steal names, birth dates, passwords, and logins.   Luckily however, the hacker was unable to find the security codes from the credit cards so nobody lost anything serious.  This was a scary moment for online gamers around the world.

Visual Cryptography Creator

Last week, I posted about visual cryptography.  Check out this website I found: http://www.leemon.com/crypto/VisualCrypto.html.

It is a really cool way to see visual cryptology.  Just follow the directions on the page and you will have a very cool message written with this unique style of cryptography.  I don't know what it is, but visual cryptography is very interesting to me.

Visual Cryptography

Check out this link. http://users.telenet.be/d.rijmenants/en/visualcrypto.htm

This is a cool type of cryptography called visual cryptography.  It is unique because it does not require the use of computers to decrypt.  It can all be decrypted with the human eye.  It was created in 1994 by Moni Naor and Adi Shamir.  Can you think of any good application of this kind of cryptography?

ASCII Art

I found this really interesting type of art on the internet called ASCII Art.  It is basically a graphic design technique that uses 95 characters from the ASCII code.  You have probably seen it before but probably didn't realize it used ASCII characters.  Check out the following example of Dwight Schrute from the office.

Passwords

We have all created passwords for various things at some point in our lives.  Most of the time, passwords are used to protect ourselves on the internet and on computers.  When I go to create a password, I try to make it complex and confusing. This way, nobody will be able to hack into my account or into my computer.  This is a lot like writing a code.  You don't want to use a simple code like a single substitution.  It is just too easy to decrypt.  Instead, it is always a good idea to use a more advanced type of code. Always try to use numbers and capital letters in your passwords.  It make them a lot more difficult to guess.