WW2 Pigeon Code Decrypted By Canadian? 158
Albanach writes "At the start of November Slashdot reported the discovery of a code, thought to be from the Second World War, found attached to the leg of a pigeon skeleton located in an English chimney. Now a Canadian by the name of Gord Young claims to have deciphered the message in less than 20 minutes. He believes that the message is comprised mostly of acronyms."
The Alleged Decoded Message (Score:5, Informative)
The alleged decoded message:
AOAKN - Artillery Observer At "K" Sector, Normandy
HVPKD - Have Panzers Know Directions
FNFJW - Final Note [confirming] Found Jerry's Whereabouts
DJHFP - Determined Jerry's Headquarters Front Posts
CMPNW - Counter Measures [against] Panzers Not Working
PABLIZ - Panzer Attack - Blitz
KLDTS - Know [where] Local Dispatch Station
27 / 1526 / 6 - June 27th, 1526 hours
Re:Backronyms (Score:4, Informative)
Regardless of either the plaintext or the encoding algorithm (though some specifically require this), splitting things into pentagrams (as in, 5-gram, not the occult symbol) pretty much ruled the crypto world for all of the modern era up to the computer age. It hides the original sentence structure (which can, in some cases, give away almost as much as an actual decryption), and works out conveniently for transcribing (that whole "seven short term memory slots" thing - If you've ever wondered why Microsoft keys use groups of five, now you know).
Re:All I have to say is... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:All I have to say is... (Score:2, Informative)