Selections from Cryptologia: History, People, and Technology (The Artech House Telecommunications Library) [Hardcover]

Cipher A. Deavours (Author), Louis Kruh (Author), David Kahn (Author), Editor Greg Mellen (Author), Editor Brian J. Winkel (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0890068623 | ISBN-13: 978-0890068625 | Publication Date: February 1998

This is a collection of articles and professional papers from "Cryptologia", a journal which focuses on the history and technology of cryptology. The volume offers personal accounts of crypto personalities, scholarly papers on the origins of cryptology, the inadequacy of cryptanalysis, and much more. Articles from "Historica" include: the unsolved messages of Pearl Harbor; Roosevelt, MAGIC and ULTRA; and diplomatic cryptanalysis in World War II. Articles from "Technologia" include: Viet Cong SIGINT and US army COMSEC in Vietnam; a World War II German radio army field cipher and how it was broken; and information on the history of the Siemens and Halske T52 cipher machines.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 552 pages
• Publisher: Artech House (February 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0890068623
• ISBN-13: 978-0890068625
• Product Dimensions: 10.4 x 7.4 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,463,808 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Information on Codes Selected by the Editors of the Magazine, July 19, 2005

By 

John Matlock "Gunny" (Winnemucca, NV) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Selections from Cryptologia: History, People, and Technology (The Artech House Telecommunications Library) (Hardcover)

Cryptologia is the definitive magazine in the area of cryptology. It's a small magazine with limited circulation, largely to professionals in the area. Often though it publishes articles dealing with areas of interest to us amateurs. These articles might include more information that has just become available on the German Enigma of World War II, or the article in this book on code breaking by the Vatican.

It now appears pretty generally accepted that the Japanese codes that had been broken did not provide any definitive information as to the attack on Pearl Harbour. There is new information however about the receipt of some messages sent in other non-broken codes that would have directly pointed to Pearl as the target. Unfortunately these codes were not broken until after the war. There is enough confusion about these messages that people are still not convinced of its truth. But there are two articles on the subject in this book, one taking each side.

Reading Cryptologia to pull out the interesting article would be a task. Artech House, the publisher of this book has managed to pull together what amounts to the editorial board of Cryptologia to put this book together. It follows the supurb book - The German Enigma Cipher Machine. These books seem expensive, but they are not printed in high volume and the contain information not available anywhere else. I recommend buying them before they go out of print.

Now I'd like to put in a request to these authors and publishers. Do a book on Russian/Soviet codes and code breaking. Success in code breaking seem to come with capabilities in music, mathematics, and chess -- skills at which the Russians seem to excell. And of course there's the Venona project.

Regardless, please keep these books coming.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars excellent cryptology book, April 25, 2000

By 

Daniel A Kurc (seattle) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Selections from Cryptologia: History, People, and Technology (The Artech House Telecommunications Library) (Hardcover)

This book is a collection of articles from the periodical "Cryptologia" The articles included are mostly recollections of memories from the people that were there, breaking and making codes. A large portion of the book is dedicated to the German Enigma used throughout WW2. This book is unparalleled as a research source and contains the best documentation I've ever seen on cryptanalysis methods employed in the past.