The earliest password tool
2017-04-24
Source: China Cryptographic Society Hits:
Sparta, one of the ancient Greek city states, is located in the south of the Laconian plain and on the west bank of the Eurotas River. Sparta is a strategic fortress, surrounded by mountains on three sides, guarding the Taygetus Mountains. Sparta is famous for its strict discipline, dictatorship and militarism.
But it was under this dictatorship that the world's first password tool was created. In about 700 BC, the ancient Greek army used a kind of round wooden stick called scytale for confidential communication. The method of use is as follows: winding the long ribbon shaped parchment on a log stick, and then writing on it; After removing the parchment, there are only disordered characters on it. Only when it is twined on a stick of the same thickness again in the same way, can the content written be seen. The advantages of being fast and not easy to interpret errors make it popular on the battlefield. However, it can be easily cracked, because this method will still leave words or "hints" that are easy to cause "association" in the encoded text, so when the original text is compiled into the encoded text, some sensitive words must be removed or replaced.
This scytale log stick may be the first text encryption and decryption tool used by humans. It is said that it is mainly used by Sparta in ancient Greek city states, so it is also called "Sparta stick".
The encryption principle of Sparta Stick belongs to the "shift method" encryption in cryptography, because it achieves the purpose of encryption by changing the reading order of letters in the text.