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December 1, 2011

Just a bunch of 1's and 0's

Yes that's right, it's time for another lesson in building and breaking code, and this time I thought I'd try tackeling binary.  Binary appears to be a superisingly common encryption technique in this communitty, possibly due to the fact that it is an extremly difficult (or more accuratly time consuming) code to crack manually, even if you know binary, but also one that is realitively simple to make or break if you have easy internet acess.  Another possible explination is that, in purely abstract terms, binary is actually more basic than regular lanuage.  Binary runs off of a simple yes or no system, it only uses two symbol 0 to represent no, and 1 to represent yes, each segment is usually eight units long (though there are some less common variations), and can be translated into a letter or symbol based off of the number and placement of the 1's.  Technially speaking, this is all you need to know to decode binary logically, but I'll get to that later.  The point is, that becuase binary only ever has eight arguments at a time, it can easily be seen as the next logical step down from rational thinking, which may be at least partially responsible for its semi-common use by people that are experinceing the mental breakdown associated with becoming "hallowed".

While most people belive that binary is "computer code", and are, for the most part, correct, binary code as we understand it was actually first concived in the 1600's by the German mathmatician Gottfried Leibniz.  Leibniz belived that all of logic could essisientially be broken down into yes or no statements, and created a system of ones and zeros to represent this.  Though this system had little to no practial uses at the time it is the first example of a system that repersents binary code as we know it now.  I'm aware that you probably don't just come here for history lectures, so I'll skip ahead, however it is always important to note binary's origin as a system logic that predates computers.  There are plenty of binary translators online, and I would recomend using those rather than trying to memorize actual binary code (while binary is relatively easy to learn, decodeing it manually is more time-consuming than trusting a website).  However, you may not always have a computer with internet acess avaliable when you find binary code, and there are some tricks to remember that can help you to crack these codes in such cases.  Here is a list of 52 letters (capatilized and lower cased) translated in binary, which I will refer back to for cracking techniques. 




Letter
Binary Code
A
01000001
B
01000010
C
01000011
D
01000100
E
01000101
F
01000110
G
01000111
H
01001000
I
01001001
J
01001010
K
01001011
L
01001100
M
01001101
N
01001110
O
01001111
P
01010000
Q
01010001
R
01010010
S
01010011
T
01010100
U
01010101
V
01010110
W
01010111
X
01011000
Y
01011001
Z
01011010

Letter
Binary Code
a
01100001
b
01100010
c
01100011
d
01100100
e
01100101
f
01100110
g
01100111
h
01101000
i
01101001
j
01101010
k
01101011
l
01101100
m
01101101
n
01101110
o
01101111
p
01110000
q
01110001
r
01110010
s
01110011
t
01110100
u
01110101
v
01110110
w
01110111
x
01111000
y
01111001
z
01111010


For the record a blank space " " is represented by 00100000, which shouldn't be suprising if you've noticed the pattern by now.

Before I get into the lists I want to note that even if you don't remember any of these tricks that you can still crack a binary code logically the same way you code a cipher as long as you treat each segment of eight numbers as an in individual letter and work from there (to help you should probably identify all of the eight segment sets and replace them with an aarbitrary number right away).  One of the first things you should notice is that all of these numbers begin with the pattern "01", which is actually quite useful when manually decoding something.  Logically there are only four possible ways for the first two digits of a binary pattern to be arranged: "00", "01", "10", "11", and if a segment of eight letters begins with any of the three crossed out patterns than you aren't dealing with a letter at all, and shouldn't bother trying to translate it  (though for the record all numbers begin with "0011") (also it should be noted that there are actually four symbols at the end of the spectrum that begin with "01", but they are rarely used).  The next thing you might notice is that the only diffrence between the capatilized and lower case letters is that wirh lower case letters there is a "1" in the third spot, and in the capatilized versions ther is a "0".  This draws attention to the fact that the first three digits can basiclly be ignored once you've checked to make sure what you're translating is actually a letter.  In case you didn't notice from the chart, the placement of the "1"'s and "0"'s is actually quite predictable after that: "00001"=a, "00010"=b, "00011"=c, and so on.  The letters start at the bottom of a scale, as the letters increase the "1"'s gradually work their way up towards the top.  And once they "fill up" the places below them, a new one forms at the top, and the places get filled in exactly the same way they did before.  For example: "00111" (which equals g) is followed by "01000" (which naturally equals h).  If you can remember this progression than binary code is actually quite easy to learn, and can be decoded with realitive ease.

Now this will probably be my last full blown post for a while, as this past week a cooling fan in my computer broke, and I want to get that fixed so I can run more energy comsuming programs without it overheating.  And since I don't want to log onto this account through public computers I won't actually be able to put anything on this blog, however I will probably still leave a few comments here and there through the nice Name Only feature on the blogs that have Anonomyous comments enabled.  Then, after next week I have finals, which means lots of essay writing and studying for my various classes, so even if I have my computer back I probably won't have the time or energy to update this thing.  Admitadly you all have your own concerns, and I'm likely not a major one of them, but this way you don't have to worry about checking back for new material inbetween all of your other various happenings.


See you around
Free

9 comments:

  1. Aww... But I run into far less drama on your blog... How will I keep my sanity in check??

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thank you StoryWeaver, and good luck on your own trails as well, whatever they mey be.

    Heh, thanks Gargoyle, and don't worry, it'll only be a couple of weeks. Besides, I'll still be around, and you already seem to be doing pretty well with your sanity considering your circumstances.

    See you around
    -Free

    ReplyDelete
  3. Ah, Leibniz. The mathematician who got into an argument with Newton over who invented calculus.

    I've had a little exposure to the binary numerical system, and I'd always wondered how it translated into letters. It reminds me a little of Braille, actually.

    And thanks, this stuff is really interesting. I had one of those moments where it clicked, like when I looked at the html codes for increasing shades of grey and realised it was a group of three two-digit hexadecimal codes representing rgb. (I didn't take computing, so I fully acknowledge that this is probably common knowledge and inevitably someone will look at this comment and laugh/face-palm.)

    ReplyDelete
  4. Hey, you know your mathmaticians, very nice. I love those epiphany moments, there's very little more satisfying than relaizing how easily you understand a concept that confused you mere moments before. I'm glad you liked it, welcome to my blog, Taunted.

    See you around
    -Free

    ReplyDelete
  5. Shame on us,
    Doomed from the start,
    May God have mercy on our dirty little hearts.

    Shame on us,
    For all we've done,
    And all we ever were,
    Just zeroes and ones.

    Goddamn nostalgia is creeping in on me again. Shit, this was supposed to be threatening.
    Er... I'll show up to your door and skin you alive. There.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I'm being... threatened? I'm flattered, but you should really check your facts, Ferus. Your father has granted protection from your list, or any other, at least for the time being. But if that ever changes look me up, always fun having another killer among my acquaintances.

    See you around
    -Cage

    ReplyDelete
  7. My Mum was really into Maths. She wanted to be a Maths teacher before she decided psychiatry was a better option. (I've never been able to understand that decision.)

    Anyway, thank you. And you can call me Barb. :)

    ReplyDelete
  8. Sure thing, and I cansee the appeal of both subjects. For all the order and consistancy mathmatics contains, the human mind and all its mystery and disorder is just as intresting.

    See you around
    -Cage

    ReplyDelete