Encryption in the 1790s
Encryption In The 1790s No comments by: Al Williams July 23, 2026 Title: Copy Short Link: Copy For as long as humans have had writing, there’s been a need to send secret messages. It is easy to think that Enigma machines and their immediate predecessors are old tech, but they are much more recent than ancient systems used by the Greeks and Romans. Even Thomas Jefferson, one of the founding fathers of the United States, was interested in encryption and is often said to have invented the Jefferson Disk machine for encryption.
- ▪Encryption In The 1790s No comments by: Al Williams July 23, 2026 Title: Copy Short Link: Copy For as long as humans have had writing, there’s been a need to send secret messages.
- ▪It is easy to think that Enigma machines and their immediate predecessors are old tech, but they are much more recent than ancient systems used by the Greeks and Romans.
- ▪Even Thomas Jefferson, one of the founding fathers of the United States, was interested in encryption and is often said to have invented the Jefferson Disk machine for encryption.
Opening excerpt (first ~120 words) tap to expand
Encryption In The 1790s No comments by: Al Williams July 23, 2026 Title: Copy Short Link: Copy For as long as humans have had writing, there’s been a need to send secret messages. It is easy to think that Enigma machines and their immediate predecessors are old tech, but they are much more recent than ancient systems used by the Greeks and Romans. Even Thomas Jefferson, one of the founding fathers of the United States, was interested in encryption and is often said to have invented the Jefferson Disk machine for encryption. The truth is, the device is probably older than Jefferson, but he certainly thought about using it for secret communications. Simple but Effective Thomas Jefferson was, apparently, a fan of secret messages The idea is simple. We make a series of disks.
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Excerpt limited to ~120 words for fair-use compliance. The full article is at Hackaday.
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