The Enigma machine is the most well-known encryption tool used by German forces in World War II, mostly because it was so famously cracked by the Allies to great effect. Like many hackers, [christofer.jh] was intrigued by the design of the Enigma, and felt compelled to build a binary version of his own design.
The original Enigma machine was designed to scramble the 26 letters in the Latin alphabet. This design is altogether simpler. Instead of 26 letters, it will scramble 1s and 0s of binary code based on the initial settings of the scrambler rings.
To send a message encoded with the machine, you must first translate your text into binary. You can use any method, and [christofer.jh] suggests a simplified one himself. Then, digit by digit, you push a button corresponding to the 1s and 0s of your message, check the output, note it down, and then push the lever to advance the rings. Enter the next digit, and so on. Decoding then involves setting up the machine in the same initial state and entering the ciphertext to get the message back out.
It’s an amusing little design and one that could be a good laugh to assemble for those interested in classical cryptographic methods. Design files are there so you can print your own if you so desire. Or, check out some previous Enigma projects from the pages of Hackaday.
Saving everyone the hassle, the model files are only available if you sign up for a “Bambu” account on the hosted website.
But they are free.
Lewin, please fix the title of your article. Thanks.
At the time of posting, it was spelt “Engima” and I tend to notice those kinds of errors. Sorry. I can’t help it, had to mention it as it was triggering me.
I would have done the same but looks like someone beat me to it
FLASH NEWS: the engima enigma is not solved yet! Poeple are running in sohck on the srteets.
It’s like a vrius, it happedns on my copmuter too. Hlep me plaese!
Should be spelled correctly now.
Thanks for the catch!
(don’t look at the URL, though, if you’re easily bothered by such things)
Also, it was never cracked… was reverse eng. Even Wikipedia say so…
It was a virus in my mind thinking about if it was possible, that’s why I had to make it.
It’s closer to a Lorenz cipher machine (which encrypted 5-bit binary code) than an Enigma.
I have uploaded a helper script to convert from/to binary. https://github.com/christoferjh/10Enigma