This is the introduction to this year’s story and not one of the competition ciphers, so you don’t need to submit your solution. It sets the scene for this year’s adventure and you don’t even need to break the cipher yourself, just play with the cipher wheel and let it do the work!
Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to decipher this message to get your instructions! It is encrypted with a keyword substitution cipher and they can be tough to break, so we have put the keyword in the Tips link above. The message will be easy to decipher once you have the key, so we thought we would bury it there so you can play with the message first to see what you make of it! The standard way to break a keyword cipher is to use frequency analysis, and you can learn all about that in the cryptanalyst handbook, or from our training materials on the resources page.
DON’T TELL ANYONE!
GUR ANGVBANY NEPUVIRF VA XRJ PBAGNVA N GUBHFNAQ LRNEF BS UVFGBEL. QBPHZRAGF BS FGNGR QNGVAT ONPX BIRE N GUBHFNAQ LRNEF NER PNERSHYYL CERFREIRQ NAQ FGHQVRQ OL UVFGBEVNAF SEBZ NEBHAQ GUR JBEYQ – SVYRF GUNG NER BSGRA FRAFVGVIR NAQ ZNEXRQ JVGU N ERYRNFR QNGR JUVPU PBHYQ OR NF YBAT NF BAR UHAQERQ LRNEF SBE CNEGVPHYNEYL FRAFVGVIR VASBEZNGVBA. ZHPU YRFF JRYY XABJA VF GUR FUNQBJ NEPUVIR, QRRC VAFVQR GUR UBZR BS OEVGVFU PBQROERNXVAT JUVPU PBAGNVAF SVYRF GUNG ZVTUG ARIRE OR ERYRNFRQ. GURL PNEEL GUR ZNEX QGN, JUVPU QRABGRF QRYRTNGR GB NEPUNRBYBTL, GUR GRNZ ERFCBAFVOYR SBE GURZ OHG GUR NEPUVIVFGF WBXR GUNG VG FGBBQ SBE QBA’G GRYY NALBAR. GURFR SVYRF PBAGNVA FRPERGF GUNG, NYBAT JVGU GURVE PVCURE XRLF, JRER YBFG YBAT NTB. AB-BAR XABJF JUNG GERNFHERF GURL ZVTUG PBAGNVA. VG VF LBHE WBO GB OERNX GUR PVCUREF NAQ GB SVAQ BHG!
If you want to play with other ciphers, head over to the official BOSS cipher tools page. You can find out more about substitution ciphers like the Caesar shift, and how to break them using frequency analysis in the BOSS Cryptanalyst Handbook, which you can find in our Library.
Top Secret: For your eyes only
The National Archives in Kew contain a thousand years of history. Documents of state dating back over a thousand years are carefully preserved and studied by historians from around the world – files that are often sensitive and marked with a release date which could be as long as one hundred years for particularly sensitive information. Much less well known is the Shadow Archive, deep inside the home of British codebreaking which contains files that might never be released. They carry the mark DTA, which denotes Delegate to Archaeology, the team responsible for them but the archivists joke that it stood for DON’T TELL ANYONE. These files contain secrets that, along with their cipher keys, were lost long ago. No-one knows what treasures they might contain. It is your job to break the ciphers and to find out!Mission (not Im)possible
EDCT OEEW VAKUE DZK U OUXX BAHJ JOA ZEO KACLYEZJH NAG QAL JA KECUBTEG. JTEQ DGE JDWEZ NGAY JTE DGCTUMEH TEGE DJ IAHH CEZJGDX DZK GEXDJE JA EMEZJH ACCLGGUZS AMEG AZE TLZKGEK DZK NUNJQ QEDGH DSA. U TDME D NEEXUZS JTDJ JTEQ YUSTJ HJUXX IE GEXEMDZJ!!! QALG JDHW UH JA KECGQBJ EDCT AN JTE KACLYEZJH DZK LBXADK QALG HAXLJUAZH AZ JTE CTDXXEZSE BDSEH. UN QAL YDWE D YUHJDWE QAL OUXX SEJ HAYE NEEKIDCW DZK CDZ JGQ DSDUZ. QAL OUXX SEJ D HCAGE NAG EDCT DJJEYBJ DZK OE OUXX ILUXK D XEDKEGIADGK LHUZS JTAHE HCAGEH. UN QAL DGE UZ D JEDY, JTEZ AZXQ JTE JEDY CDBJDUZ CDZ LBXADK HLIYUHHUAZH, HA YDWE HLGE QAL OAGW OUJT JTEY JA SEJ QALG DZHOEGH HLIYUJJEK. UZ QALG DCCALZJ BDSEH QAL OUXX NUZK D GECAGK AN QALG HLIYUHHUAZH, JASEJTEG OUJT D CABQ AN D CEGJUNUCDJE GECAGKUZS QALG BGASGEHH. UN QAL ODZJ QAL CDZ DXXAO QALG JEDCTEG JA NAXXAO QALG BGASGEHH IQ SEJJUZS JTE JEDY CDBJDUZ JA EZJEG D HBECUDX BUZ ZLYIEG (JTE JEDCTEG\’H YAZUJAGUZS BUZ) UZJA JTE JEDY KEJDUXH AZ JTEUG DCCALZJ BDSE. UN QAL TDME DZQ FLEHJUAZH JTEZ TEDK AMEG JA JTE NAGLY OTEGE QAL OUXX NUZK XAJH AN NGUEZKXQ DKMUCE! SAAK XLCW, TDGGQ
This tool is the official BOSS substitution cipher cracker. If you paste a text into the box and tell it the substitution alphabet for the cipher then it will decipher the text for you! The hard part is working out the substitution alphabet which is almost always given by a key. If you type a keyword into the KEY box it will start the decrypt for you, but you will still need to complete the alphabet to get a full decrypt. You can use frequency analysis to try to work out the substitutions and there are full instructions for that in the BOSS Cryptanalysts handbook. Since this introduction is not part of the competition you can skip all that and look up the cipher key in the Tips box at the top of this page!