The perfect cipher

摘要

The history of cryptography is punctuated by the invention of clever systems to encipher messages and, sometime later, equally clever systems for cryptanalysing the enciphered messages to determine their meaning. Most enciphering schemes of any worth enjoy a relatively lengthy period of prominence before sufficiently determined cryptanalysts undermine their security by figuring out how to attack them. In response, cryptographers devise new and improved schemes and then the cycle repeats. Cryptographers have learned from history that it is dangerous to declare any enciphering scheme unbreakable; at best they are considered to be very secure. But there is one scheme, a scheme that has been around since 1917, that truly is unbreakable. It is the perfect cipher.