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From: whp@apr.UUCP
Newsgroups: sci.crypt
Subject: Re: Any Beale Cipher Fans out there?
Message-ID: <282@apr.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 30-Sep-87 02:42:51 EDT
Article-I.D.: apr.282
Posted: Wed Sep 30 02:42:51 1987
Date-Received: Fri, 2-Oct-87 06:25:26 EDT
References: <785@phoenix.PRINCETON.EDU>
Reply-To: whp@apr.UUCP (Wayne Pollock)
Organization: APR, Columbus, OH
Lines: 15
Keywords: TJB, Beale
Summary: Its all a hoax! claims cryptologist

I was recently reading D. Denning's book on "cryptogaphy and data security";
she reports findings by J. Gillogly in 1980 (I have a reference if you want)
that tend to show that they are a hoax.  In B1, deciphered using initial
letters of Declaration of Independence, the following sequence shows up in
the plaintext: ABFDEFGHIJKLMMNOHPP.  The finst F is encrypted as 195 and
word 194 begins with a C.  Also the last H is encrypted as 301 and word 302
begins with an O.  Somebody named Hammer claims to have found 23 encryption
errors in B1, so its likely that F for C and H for O were typos, and that the
sequence should be: ABCDEFGHIJKLMMNOOPP.  You must admit this is an unlikely
sequence to turn up unless the DOI is the key and the message is a hoax.

I will be the first to admit that it is also possible this sequence is a clue.
I wonder what famous books, authors, or documents in the early 1800s have the
Wayne Pollock
initials MOP (the only doubled letters)?