A null cipher is an ancient form of encryption where the plaintext is mixed with a large amount of non-cipher material. It would today be regarded as a simple form of steganography. Null ciphers can also be used to hide ciphertext, as part of a more complex system.
In classical cryptography a null is intended to confuse the cryptanalyst. Typically, a null will be a character which decrypts to obvious nonsense at the end of an otherwise intelligible phrase. In a null cipher, most of the characters may be nulls.
An example follows (Kipper 9):
- News Eight Weather: Tonight increasing snow. Unexpected precipitation smothers eastern towns. Be extremely cautious and use snowtires especially heading east. The knowingly slippery. Highway evacuation is suspected. Police report emergency situations in downtown ending near Tuesday.
Taking the first letter in each word successively yields the real message: "Newt is upset because he thinks he is President."
Famous quotes containing the words null and/or cipher:
“A strong person makes the law and custom null before his own will.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“It is not an arbitrary “decree of God,” but in the nature of man, that a veil shuts down on the facts of to-morrow; for the soul will not have us read any other cipher than that of cause and effect. By this veil, which curtains events, it instructs the children of men to live in to-day.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)