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

The Code Book: The Science of Secrecy from Ancient Egypt to Quantum Cryptography is a good book to learn the history and some of the concepts behind cryptography.

A good text for beginners is Simon Singh's The Code Book.

"The Code Book" by Simon Singh is a really great introduction via the history of cryptography. It covers a lot of old codes and how they are broken in detail, and then touches on more modern cryptography towards the end. It has a great bibliography to springboard you toward more detailed knowledge.

Great episode!

If anybody is interested in the history of cryptography and how it works, I suggest checking out "The Code Book: The Science of Secrecy from Ancient Egypt to Quantum Cryptography" (Amazon link).

Although I haven't finished the book yet, I've found it very interesting so far. A good chunk of the book talks about cryptography in WWI and WWII, which I found pretty interesting. The Zimmerman telegram mentioned in this video is included in the book I believe.

Here is the explanation that stuck with me. It's from a mathematician here on Reddit and it made /r/bestof a year ago: https://www.reddit.com/r/math/comments/3tn1xq/what_intuitively_obvious_mathematical_statements/cx7np4t/

Also, check out The Code Book by Simon Singh for a fascinating history of how encryption got to where we are today, and where we are going.

Is there an English translation of Codes? I can only seem to find German versions.


I really enjoyed The Code Book by Singh (it's basically a history of cryptography).

Without knowing how much of introduction you need, I would probably suggest Code Book by Simon Singh. It's really accessible and goes over a lot of the basic concepts (and a little history) of cryptography.

I only took one class on the subject and we used this book. I found it pretty interesting and accessible enough for self study, but I'm a casual student of the subject and really can't vouch for it's rigor or whatever.

http://www.amazon.com/Boy-Roald-Dahl-ebook/dp/B00F9F0TV6/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1420691549&sr=1-1&keywords=roald+dahl+boy

http://www.amazon.com/Code-Book-Science-Secrecy-Cryptography-ebook/dp/B004IK8PLE/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1420691613&sr=1-1&keywords=the+code+book+simon+singh

"Boy" is probably "beneath" your son's level and "The Code Book" is may challenge your daughter but I think that those are books that they could both enjoy, so that'd be good bang-for-buck.

I'll also recommend "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes," for your son, and, maybe, some classics, like "The Swiss Family Robinson" or Jules Verne but it's difficult, not knowing anything about them (not that you should be posting detailed descriptions of your kids).

Some pretty good reads on the subject:

Top Secret: A Handbook of Codes, Ciphers and Secret Writing https://www.amazon.com/dp/0763629723/ref=cm_sw_r_awd_WF1Dub0WN55RY

The Code Book: The Science of Secrecy from Ancient Egypt to Quantum Cryptography https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B004IK8PLE/ref=aw_ss_kndl_dp/

Codebreaker: The History of Codes and Ciphers https://www.amazon.com/dp/0802715478/ref=cm_sw_r_awd_OH1Dub103RXB7

And, believe it or not,

Cracking Codes and Cryptograms For Dummies https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B005CB22A8/ref=aw_ss_kndl_dp/

You also might check your local newspaper for "Cryptoquote." It's a daily quote that uses a different cipher each day. Great for practice!

If you want to understand the state of privacy, I highly recommend reading this book:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B004IK8PLE?ref_=cm_sw_r_kb_dp_j4QBCb50GGMEN&tag=kpembed-20&linkCode=kpe

This is not a fight that we win or lose. This is a never ending war with skirmishes and stalemates. You are in charge of your own privacy with what you say or do.