Books and Articles by Mark Koltko-Rivera

Cryptography offers you the chance to solve all kinds of puzzles. Use basic solving techniques to crack substitution ciphers, including the Freemason’s cipher. Encode your own messages, decode incoming communications, and have fun trying to figure out conspiracies, codes, and cryptograms!Cryptography 101: Basic solving techniques for substitution ciphersIt doesn’t matter whether a cryptogram presents you with letters, numbers, arcane symbols, lines and dots, or weird alien squiggles — if you’re asked to replace each letter in the alphabet with another symbol, you’re dealing with a simple substitution cipher.

These five cryptograms are all letter substitution ciphers, at an Easy level. Each letter of the alphabet is substituted by another letter, and no letter is encrypted as itself.To start out on these puzzles, look for the most frequent letter in each cryptogram — you’ll find it’s almost always E. Single-letter words will be A or I.

Solving cryptograms is a great way to stay mentally fit! Studies have shown that working puzzles of any sort, especially challenging ones, keeps you mentally agile and on the ball. These benefits can help you no matter what your age! Tricky Symbol Cipher 1. This More Code message is an adaptation from the eulogy of George Washington delivered by Henry “Light-Horse Harry” Lee.

Letter frequency analysis is the way to crack these cryptograms. You can do a tally of how many times each cipher letter appears within each cipher. The most common letter is likely to be E, with T and A as other good options. You can find more tips on how to crack cryptograms on the Cracking Codes & Cryptograms For Dummies Cheat Sheet.

These symbol substitution ciphers are extra tricky, but don’t let the level of difficulty dissuade you! You can be quite proud of yourself if you crack these puzzles! Hard Symbol Cipher 1. Be careful: This Illuminati cipher has different symbols for upper- and lower-case letters. The message is from noted Freemason, Albert Pike: Hard Symbol Cipher 1 Hint Hard Symbol Cipher 1 Answer Hard Symbol Cipher 2.

These number substitution cryptograms come from a variety of sources, from ancient times to the modern day. Use your letter frequency skills to crack them! You can find more tips on how to crack cryptograms on the Cracking Codes & Cryptograms For Dummies Cheat Sheet. Tricky Number Cipher 1. The numbers in this cipher have been randomly assigned as any two digit number between 01 and 99.

Printing out this page will make it easier to solve these cryptograms. Drawing a light vertical pencil line between the words in a symbol cipher makes it easier for you to see the words and letter patterns. Medium Symbol Cipher 1. Adapted from a story told about the last days of traitor Benedict Arnold (who died in 1801): Medium Symbol Cipher 1 Hint Medium Symbol Cipher 1 Answer Medium Symbol Cipher 2.

Cracking Codes & Cryptograms For Dummies has something extra — a secret word within the book for you to discover! This secret word isn’t listed in the Hints or Answers, and it isn’t mentioned anywhere within the book. The only way you can discover it is by solving the puzzles. Here are a few pointers to get you started on the trail: The secret word occurs as a keyword within one of the substitution cryptograms.

With a Caesar Cipher, the cipher alphabet wraps around the plain alphabet. For example, if there is a +1 shift, A=B, B=C, C=D, and so on to Z=A. Once you have figured out one or two of the letters in a Caesar cipher, the rest of the encryption will fall out easily. Tricky Caesar Cipher 1.When this encrypted letter was deciphered by American codebreakers during World War I, it resulted in a death sentence for the man mentioned in it.