The enigma machine lesson 2
- 2. What was the enigma machine?The Enigma machine was an advanced cipher machine that was developed in Germany after WW2.
- 3. The Enigma MachineThe enigma machine was used by all branches of the German Military and their main device for secure wireless communications until the end of WW2. Several types of Enigma machine were developed before and during WW2, each of them developed in complexity.The German Navy used the most complex machine.
- 4. How the Enigma Machine workedThe basic operating procedure of the Enigma machine was simple. To send an encrypted message, the operator set the Enigma's electric and mechanical settings (the plug wirings and the rotor wheels) to a predefined initial combination known to him and to the receiving operator.Then he typed the free text message on the Enigma's keyboard. For each typed letter, a different letter was lit in the upper board.
- 5. How the Enigma Machine worked cont.The operator wrote down each lit letter, so that when he finished typing the original message on the Enigma, he had a meaningless stream of letters, which was the Enigma-encrypted message.He then transmitted the encrypted message with a standard Morse code radio transmitter. The receiving operator wrote the received encrypted message, set his Enigma machine to the same pre-defined combination, and then typed the message at the machine's keyboard. Which would then give him the meaning.