Kryptos was commissioned when the Central Intelligence Agency was outgrowing its original headquarters in the 1980s. Jim Sanborn, already a well-known artist in the area, was one of the artists selected by the General Services Administration to create artwork around the new building. Sanborn spent several months researching the CIA’s history, and chose to create a sculpture with a theme of espionage and cryptography. He entitled his work Kryptos, the Greek word for “hidden.” He was also introduced to Ed Scheidt, a retired CIA operative who had been the chairman of the CIA’s cryptographic center, who tutored Sanborn on various historical methods of encryption. Sanborn then personally chose the plaintext messages to be encrypted, and carved the ciphers into the sculpture.
Sanborn also designed several other pieces around CIA grounds, with his works being in two areas: Some in a new landscaped courtyard between the original and new headquarters buildings, and others on the opposite side of the new headquarters building, outside the main entrance. Along with the main Kryptos sculpture, he also placed several foot-thick granite slabs appearing to rise at a tilt from the ground. Some of the slabs have sandwiched Morse code messages on copper sheets, which Sanborn described as being like the pages of a document. Another slab has an engraved compass rose pointing at a magnetic lodestone.
In early 1992, a partial transcript of the sculpture was provided in the March/April issue of the periodical Cryptogram, and then a full transcript was posted on the Internet. The next major announcement came in 1999, when California computer scientist Jim Gillogly announced that he had solved the first three parts of the sculpture using a computer program he had written. When the CIA was contacted about his solution, they revealed that a CIA analyst, David Stein, had also solved those three parts in 1998, using pencil and paper techniques, but the announcement had been internal only, never released publicly. Another U.S. intelligence agency, the National Security Agency (NSA), also revealed that they had a team that had quietly solved those first three parts as well, in late 1992. But no one, in or outside the government agencies, has yet reported a solution to Part 4, which remains one of the most famous unsolved codes in the world. (The latest information on the Kryptos puzzle can be found at http://www.elonka.com/kryptos.)
In 2003, over a decade after the sculpture’s unveiling, even more public attention came with the publication of The Da Vinci Code. Hidden in the artwork of the U.S. book jacket were multiple puzzles, giving hints about Brown’s next novel. Two of the puzzles referred to Kryptos, with latitude/longitude coordinates, and the phrase “only WW knows.”
The Ciphers
Part 1 of Kryptos
The first part of Kryptos (referred to as K1, that is, K-one, by those who are working on it) is made up of the top two lines on the ciphertext side of the sculpture:
EMUFPHZLRFAXYUSDJKZLDKRNSHGNFIVJ
YQTQUXQBQVYUVLLTREVJYQTMKYRDMFD
This was encrypted with a Vigenère system, or “polyalphabetic substitution cipher,” a system most commonly used in the nineteenth century. There are many variants of Vigenère ciphers, which can be further complicated by which or how many key words are used, and how the deciphering tableau is formatted. In the case of K1, the keys that were used were the words KRYPTOS and PALIMPSEST (a palimpsest is a term for a scroll or manuscript that has been written on more than once, with some of the earlier writing still remaining visible). Using those two keys with the proper Vigenère system on K1, reveals the plaintext (answer):
Between subtle shading and the absence of light, lies the nuance of iqlusion.
Sanborn has said that this was an original sentence, written by him, with carefully chosen wording. The misspelling of the word “illusion” was deliberate, either as a clue, or perhaps simply as a way to make the cipher more difficult to crack.
Part 2 of Kryptos
The second part of Kryptos (K2) takes up the rest of the top ciphertext plate on the sculpture:
VFPJUDEEHZWETZYVGWHKKQETGFQJNCE
GGWHKK?DQMCPFQZDQMMIAGPFXHQRLG
TIMVMZJANQLVKQEDAGDVFRPJUNGEUNA
QZGZLECGYUXUEENJTBJLBQCRTBJDFHRR
YIZETKZEMVDUFKSJHKFWHKUWQLSZFTI
HHDDDUVH?DWKBFUFPWNTDFIYCUQZERE
EVLDKFEZMOQQJLTTUGSYQPFEUNLAVIDX
FLGGTEZ?FKZBSFDQVGOGIPUFXHHDRKF
FHQNTGPUAECNUVPDJMQCLQUMUNEDFQ
ELZZVRRGKFFVOEEXBDMVPNFQXEZLGRE
DNQFMPNZGLFLPMRJQYALMGNUVPDXVKP
DQUMEBEDMHDAFMJGZNUPLGEWJLLAETG
Similar to K1, this, too, used a Vigenère system, but with different key words, KRYPTOS and ABSCISSA (a term meaning the x-coordinate on a graph). The plaintext is:
It was totally invisible. How’s that possible? They used the earth’s magnetic field. x The information was gathered and transmitted undergruund to an unknown location. x Does Langley know about this? They should: it’s buried out there somewhere. x Who knows the exact location? Only WW. This was his last message. x Thirty eight degrees fifty seven minutes six point five seconds north, seventy seven degrees eight minutes forty four seconds west. x Layer two.
The latitude/longitude coordinates point inside CIA headquarters, to a spot in the same courtyard where Kryptos stands, though not to the sculpture itself. The coordinates are actually very specific, down to a tenth of a second of latitude: “6.5 seconds North.” As geocache hobbyists know, a tenth of a second of latitude is a very specific location, about 10 feet across. The coordinates point about 150 feet southeast of the sculpture, in the same courtyard, along the edge of the landscaped area that Sanborn designed near the agency cafeteria. If this were a public park, doubtless tourists with shovels would have descended upon the area by now, but since the coordinates are at the center of a top secret facility, employees are of course discouraged from digging up the gardens!
Part 3 of Kryptos
K3 begins at the top of the second ciphertext plate:
ENDYAHROHNLSRHEOCPTEOIBIDYSHNAIA
CHTNREYULDSLLSLLNOHSNOSMRWXMNE
TPRNGATIHNRARPESLNNELEBLPIIACAE
WMTWNDITEENRAHCTENEUDRETNHAEOE
TFOLSEDTIWENHAEIOYTEYQHEENCTAYCR
EIFTBRSPAMHHEWENATAMATEGYEERLB
TEEFOASFIOTUETUAEOTOARMAEERTNRTI
BSEDDNIAAHTTMSTEWPIEROAGRIEWFEB
AECTDDHILCEIHSITEGOEAOSDDRYDLORIT
RKLMLEHAGTDHARDPNEOHMGFMFEUHE
ECDMRIPFEIMEHNLSSTTRTVDOHW
This uses a different type of cipher system, transposition rather than substitution. Transposition systems mean that all of the letters in the solution are already there, they’re just rearranged via a particular method. The plaintext for Part 3 is:
Slowly, desparatly slowly, the remains of passage debris that encumbered the lower part of the doorway was removed. With trembling hands I made a tiny breach in the upper lefthand corner, and then widening the hole a little, I inserted the candle and peered in. The hot air escaping from the chamber caused the flame to flicker, but presently details of the room within emerged from the mist. x Can you see anything? q
This is a paraphrased extract from the diary of archaeologist Howard Carter on November 26, 1922, the day that he discovered King Tut’s tomb, in the Valley of the Kings in Egypt.
Part 4 of Kryptos
Then there is K4, which as of this writing remains unsolved:
?OBKR
UOXOGHULBSOLIFBBWFLRVQQPRNGKSSO
TWTQSJQSSEKZZWATJKLUDIAWINFBNYP
VTTMZFPKWGDKZXTJCDIGKUHUAUEKCAR
Why has no one been able to solve K4?
For one, because it’s very short, only 97 or 98 characters (it’s unknown if the leading question mark is part of K3 or K4). Generally when cryptanalysts are working on a difficult cipher, they need large amounts of ciphertext to work with. With a very short message, it becomes very difficult to find the mathematical patterns that are n
eeded to crack a code.
Another reason it may not have been solved is because of the sculpture’s inaccessibility. Kryptos was never intended as a public challenge, and was instead designed as a puzzle for the employees of the CIA. So it’s possible that there is a needed clue on CIA grounds, which is unknown to non-CIA employees who may be working on K4.
Other reasons may include misdirection, which would fit into the theme of espionage. Both Sanborn and Scheidt have said that K4 is solvable, and Scheidt has added that the answer is in English, and will use all of the letters of K4. But this may be misdirection: it’s possible that the answer isn’t in English, and may even use some long-dead language. Indeed, since Kryptos, Sanborn has created several other encrypted sculptures, some of which do not use English. Sanborn’s Cyrillic Projector, created after Kryptos, and currently at the University of North Carolina, Charlotte, uses encrypted text in the Cyrillic alphabet. Its ciphers were cracked via a joint effort of international cryptographers in 2003, revealing two Russian texts: one about psychological control of human sources, and another an extract from a 1982 classified KGB memo. Sanborn has also created sculptures that have languages in other non-Latin scripts: Greek, Amharic, Arabic, and many others.
Lastly, it’s possible that Sanborn simply made a mistake in the encryption process. In fact, in 2006 he announced that he had made at least one error on the sculpture, omitting a letter from K2, which required the answer to be reworked. Previous solvers had thought that the last part of K2 said “ID by Rows,” but after the error was announced, the true answer turned out to be “x Layer two.” When Sanborn was then asked in an NPR interview if he was sure that the rest is correct, he said yes, that it is “safe and sound and fairly accurate.” Scheidt, too, has said that he’s “sure it’s done right.” He has also said that the fourth part uses different techniques than were used for the first three parts, and that it uses some kind of masking technique to make things even more difficult.
An ancient portal buried out there somewhere?
So is Brown’s “Fact” statement true or false? Let’s look at it section by section:
Fact: In 1991, a document was locked in the safe of the director of the CIA. The document is still there today.
Possibly true. Sculptor Sanborn did give an envelope with the Kryptos plaintext to CIA director William Webster in 1990, though what Webster did with the envelope is not clear. It’s also unclear whether or not Webster even had a safe in his office, and if he did, whether the Kryptos envelope would be worthy of taking up space there. More likely the envelope was passed off to a historical department of some sort.
Its cryptic text includes references to an ancient portal
True. Part 3 of Kryptos refers to the portal of King Tut’s tomb, discovered in 1922 in Egypt.
and an unknown location underground.
True. Though this is referring to a different part of the answer, in Part 2.
The document also contains the phrase “It’s buried out there somewhere.”
True. This phrase is from the decrypted text of Part 2. Though the question remains, just because the text says something is “buried out there,” did Sanborn really bury something at the CIA, while he was installing Kryptos? And if he did, is it even still there?
We may never know.
Chapter Nine
Divining Dan Brown
The Pursuit of Dan Brown
From Secrets of the Widow’s Son to The Lost Symbol
by David A. Shugarts
In 2005, Dave Shugarts published an amazing book: Secrets of the Widow’s Son (SOWS). There has never been anything like SOWS before: a book-length work about a novel that had not yet been published. It was a predictive work that sought to guess what a bestselling novelist would write in the future—years before a single word of that future novel had been put on paper. It was not just any fiction writer—it was Dan Brown—world’s bestselling author of adult fiction, known for the shocks, surprises, and thought provocations of The Da Vinci Code. Could Dave Shugarts really make educated guesses about the elements of history, philosophy, art, architecture, religion, mysticism, and science that Dan Brown would choose to use in his then-unwritten sequel to The Da Vinci Code?
As if writing a book about a book that has yet to be published were not a tall enough order, we gave Dave a challenge-within-the-challenge: go ahead and predict what Dan Brown will use as context and backdrop for his next novel. But do it in such a way that, whether you are right or wrong, the end product will be a fascinating, eye-opening book about Freemasons and American history, the ideas of the Enlightenment, science, ancient wisdom, myth, religion, and cosmology.
Nearly five years later, The Lost Symbol is here and Dave Shugarts has proven to be amazingly, uncannily, brilliantly right. In the following commentary, Shugarts sums up how he got interested in trying to predict the steps on Dan Brown’s journey to a Da Vinci Code sequel and how his own journey into the world of these ideas unfolded.
Dan Brown writes books that compel you to turn the page and find out where the plot will take you. But for certain people—me, for instance—it’s even more compelling. We wind up on a never-ending journey of discovery, in pursuit of the mind of Dan Brown.
After contributing to Secrets of the Code in 2004, I guessed that Dan Brown’s next book in the Robert Langdon series would be a kind of treasure hunt set in Washington, D.C., and involving the Freemasons.
In 2005 I wrote Secrets of the Widow’s Son, a book that anticipated the 2009 publication of The Lost Symbol by more than four years. The aim was to “reverse engineer,” through certain clues and a lot of research, what Dan Brown was interested in and what he might write about in a sequel to The Da Vinci Code. I also sought out the more personal story of Dan Brown, the unlikely novelist from Exeter, New Hampshire, by way of Amherst College and Los Angeles. I visited his hometown, his prep school, and his college, producing an extensive biographical sketch that was published later in the paperback edition of Secrets of the Code.
Well, it’s time to open the sealed envelope and reveal the results of my forecasts from 2005: my book, Secrets of the Widow’s Son, scored quite a number of direct hits on the target, including some uncannily accurate details that can be found in The Lost Symbol. And there were some misses.
My original guesses about Washington and the Freemasons turned out to be correct. But I think more important was my belief that The Lost Symbol (TLS) would not necessarily center on a hunt for a lost treasure that was gold or had other intrinsic value. Rather, I guessed it might be a hunt for a powerful secret. This turned out to be correct. The actual secret in TLS turned out to be anticlimactic—for me, at least. It was not what I was anticipating, but it did align exactly with the larger themes I had traced.
I think Dan Brown’s real secret is that he has tapped into what I would call the “Interconnectedness of Everything.”
Like the “underground stream” of the occult, this is a kind of extra dimension allowing one to travel through space and time, back to the Egyptian pyramids and then forward to the Washington Monument, or back to Isaac Newton and then forward to Einstein, or back to the prehistoric carvers of voluptuous fertility statues and then forward to Michelangelo. One of the keys to this dimension is symbolism, whether it be graphic, literary, or artistic symbolism.
No one can possibly map the entirety of this dimension, because to the mystics, cosmologists, and noeticists who inhabit this world, literally everything in the universe fits together and is interconnected in certain consequential ways. But anyone can explore this world of interconnections at any level of depth and complexity they choose, and many have. This is the voyage of discovery that Dan Brown undertook when he set out to write Angels & Demons, and continued in The Da Vinci Code and has now raised to its most explicit character in The Lost Symbol. It is a voyage that always entices one to a farther
horizon. My task has been to pursue Dan Brown on this voyage and, at times, even sail ahead of him if I could.
The Quest Begins
It has now been more than five years since I started my quest to know all things Dan Brown. For me, it began with a couple of startling plot errors that I noticed when I read The Da Vinci Code (DVC) in early 2004. Naively, I actually wrote Dan Brown a letter, pointing out the flaws and suggesting ways to fix them. I never got a reply, but that’s understandable, since by then, Dan Brown was avoiding interviews in the wake of the many controversies that DVC had started.
When Dan Burstein and Arne de Keijzer invited me to write about plot flaws for our book, Secrets of the Code, I began to survey the vast frontier that had been opened up via Dan Brown’s allusions to art and symbolism, to history and culture, across many ages and a wide swath of the globe. I felt I had caught a glimpse of Brown’s horizons.
When I learned of the clues that Brown had left in the dust jacket of DVC, hinting at his next book, the fun really began. The main clue was a question spelled out by putting together a series of boldface letters on the flaps of the original hardcover 2003 edition of The Da Vinci Code: “Is there no help for the widow’s son?” This is a Freemason’s cry for help when in distress, and it did indeed find a place in the plot of TLS.
In early 2004, our Secrets team announced that I had made the basic guess that Brown’s next novel after DVC would be set in Washington, D.C., and would involve the Freemasons. It was an amazing conclusion to draw at the time, but it took less than a month to be confirmed, by Dan Brown’s publishers and by Brown himself. Then Dan Brown clammed up—in a generalized silence that lasted most of the next five years—and of course, that spurred my curiosity as a journalist.
Secrets of The Lost Symbol Page 33
