Thread

OpenAI GPT–6 Astra breaks Enigma message that has resisted solution since 2005

738 points · 448 comments · sohkamyung

mmsc · 1790086381 · focus · HN ↗
For anybody interested, the actual encrypted message:
```
  BTTE UM ANGABE DES MARSQWEGES X BEFINDE MIQ IN X ROSENOW ROSENOW X SOFORT FUNKANTWORT X WASCHBBSCH
```
which, given misspellings, translates approximately to:
```
  Please specify the route of march. I am in Rosenow, Rosenow. Immediate reply by radio. Waschbusch.
```
1. yitchelle · 1790087220 · focus · HN ↗
  was the misspellings deliberate?
  1. busssard · 1790087657 · focus · HN ↗
    i would assume yes, to throw off decyphering. even more impressive that they managed to crack it
    kadoban · 1790110220 · focus · HN ↗
    > i would assume yes, to throw off decyphering. even more impressive that they managed to crack it
    Were operators of enigma machines aware enough of cryptology or the weaknesses of enigma, for that to have been done intentionally to prevent decryption? I doubt it, otherwise _many_ things should have been done _much_ differently by the operators.
    damnesian · 1790113143 · focus · HN ↗
    I'm surprised "Bitte" --> "btte" was a hurdle. "Bitte," or "please," is ubiquitous in German. The more common the term, them more likely you'd be to see some contractions. Dropping the "i" is pretty logical- anyone looking at it would see immediately what it meant.
    tomjakubowski · 1790125644 · focus · HN ↗
    To be clear, the text in the comment is the plaintext, not the ciphertext. The plaintext is what's full of typos.
    The ciphertext of message Nr 172 was:
    MVUEH IDEVS ARMCC NQTAT YEVFC DBZGG SMXWL PSYWZ YTCBS WURRT BZCVG ODVJU SLSOO MJQJZ SXSEB ZPEYM DNXJF TC
    <a href="https://cryptocellar.org/bgac/g-army-july-1941.html" rel="nofollow">https://cryptocellar.org/bgac/g-army-july-1941.html
  2. kzrdude · 1790088686 · focus · HN ↗
    Looks like Q is used as an abbreviation for CH
    marvinborner · 1790165973 · focus · HN ↗
    Interestingly, in MARSQWEGES -> MARSCHWEGES, but not in WASCHBBSCH (WASQBUSQ)
  3. a_bonobo · 1790168280 · focus · HN ↗
    A while ago I read Between Silk and Cyanide, the autobiography of one of the main actors of WW2 cryptographers, Leo Marks. He had a whole unit working on 'indecipherables', too-hard-to-decrypt messages where the field-agents either misspelled words or misused the encryption keys. You can imagine how often agents misspelled, having to do all the encryption manually under great lots of stress.
    (There's an interesting story on Operation North Pole, where Marks suspected that a Dutch resistance group had been overtaken by the SS, and it was actually the SS sending the encrypted messages: all the encryption and spelling was suddenly perfect)

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