43 pages • 1 hour read
Simon SinghThe Code Book: The Science of Secrecy from Ancient Egypt to Quantum Cryptography
Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 1999A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
The Ethical Dilemmas of Cryptography
It would be difficult to find someone who considered the very act of encryption to be ethically problematic in itself. The simple act of transforming a plain message into a hidden one is in itself a neutral act. Historically speaking, the ethical nature of any particular act has been determined by three categories: the kind of act done, the intention of the act, and the circumstances surrounding the act. The dilemma appears not in the act of encryption, but in the intention of the act and in the circumstances that surround the act.
Intention concerns why the encryption is being done. When done for positive reasons—sending a message on how to escape a concentration camp, for instance—all would agree that the intention would be noble and good. When the intention is nefarious, however, it turns a neutral act of simple encryption into a bad act, such as that of criminals encrypting information on their activities and plans to commit crime. Those who view encryption as a danger to civil society typically focus on the criminal possibilities of cryptography, claiming that “criminals and terrorists would be able to communicate in secret, safe from police wiretaps” (403-04). This is, of course, true, and so the debate becomes one about prudential means to ensure the common good and public safety.
Those with a more libertarian bend to their politics tend to see encryption as an unmitigated good that is essential for protecting civil liberties and privacy. They typically point to the 12th article of the universal declaration of human rights, which states the following: “No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence” (407, emphasis added). Encryption is a sure means to enforce this statute. Those who oppose widespread and limitless encryption, however, also pose their stance as contributing to the common good, simply approaching the problem from the other end by typically arguing that those with nothing to hide should not mind the possibility of their private information being available to legitimate authorities.
In the end, the ethics of cryptology will always revolve around the legitimate use of such technology, and as with all things, intention is going to be the key. As Singh’s analysis suggests, attitudes toward privacy and where and when boundaries should be drawn between public and private spheres tend to shift back and forth over time. In times of tension over assumed external threats—such as in the post-9/11 “War on Terror” that evolved shortly after the book’s publication—attitudes toward government surveillance tend to soften, while attitudes tend to veer more toward skepticism when the main concern appears as a domestic one, specifically government overreach. Ultimately, the debate continues and changes in different times, places, and circumstances.
The Necessity of Intellectual Diversity in Cryptography
The very first cryptologists were generally linguists, those skilled in languages and words, and who were creative enough to use their skill and interest to their advantage in developing ciphers and codes that could be used as substitutes for normal writing. Once cryptology entered a stage of growth, however, and began to see new levels of sophistication and complexity, restricting the field to mere linguistics became impossible. For instance, in the 15th century, developments in cryptology and encryption were made by the “Florentine polymath Leon Battista Alberti […] a painter, composer, poet and philosopher” (74). Developing new methods of encryption and secrecy using codes and ciphers required a kind of invention and creativity that defied its being a hostage to any one discipline.
Over the years, all manner of minds have tried their hand at the cryptological puzzle. In fact, “[i]n their efforts to destroy and preserve secrecy, both sides have drawn upon a diverse range of disciplines and technologies, from mathematics to linguistics, from information theory to quantum theory” (11). Both those who wish to hide and encrypt information, as well as those who desire to decrypt and decipher information, have tried their hand at all manner of solutions in order to perfect their part in the craft. What is fascinating is that cryptology is not a primitive tactic, but a highly advanced one. Steganography, the act of simply hiding messages, could be considered primitive, but not cryptology.
In fact, cryptology requires a sufficiently advanced society and academic culture: “Cryptanalysis could not be invented until a civilization had reached a sufficiently sophisticated level of scholarship in several disciplines, including mathematics, statistics and linguistics” (34-35). The reason, of course, is that cryptology requires a synthesis of skills in language and statistics. In order for a message to be transformed by a cipher, the algorithm needs to be capable of transforming the parts that make up the original message as well as making it communicable. This necessitates the cooperation of a number of specialty fields, without which complex ciphers and codes would simply not be capable of existing, let alone being solved or developing to the (almost) infinitely complex systems we possess today.
Privacy in the Modern World
The need for privacy is ubiquitous in contemporary society. This is not because privacy was never necessary or desirable in the past, but because it is an intrinsically important reality in the modern world where privacy is more easily violated than at any previous point in history.
In the past, if someone wanted to invade another’s privacy, there would have to be physical infiltration of some kind: breaking into a home, stealing a safe, or intercepting a letter. Nowadays, espionage is as simple as making a few strokes on a keyboard. Part of the tension in contemporary society as far as technology and surveillance is concerned is directly related to this issue of privacy. Many of The Ethical Dilemmas of Cryptography revolve around the divisions between the public and private spheres, but the rapid advance of communicative technology has left the average person’s privacy far more vulnerable.
The average person in the 21st century encounters a dozen instances every day where their privacy could conceivably be violated and their personal information compromised: accidentally linking to the wrong wi-fi router downtown, clicking on a phishing email at work, or getting caught up in hacks on major databases of companies or government agencies. The possibilities are endless. Technology to protect privacy, then, is an essential part of modern life: “However, as with every technology, there is a dark side to encryption” (393). Life is lived in balance with competing interests: How does one keep his/her private life as secure and secret as possible while simultaneously making life easy and convenient? These desires are often at odds with one another—privacy is often neither cheap nor convenient, but modern life seems to demand a kind of compromise.
In the early days of the internet, there was no consistent way to confirm that you were doing business with a legitimate entity or that the person you believed you were speaking to was in fact really that person. Technology responded to address these concerns: “In order to develop trust on the Internet, it [was] essential that there is some form of reliable digital signature” (399). Now, decades later, the internet is replete with forms of two-step verification, smartphones have features that can only be unlocked by fingerprints or facial identification software, and digital bank settings can be adjusted to the point where every single transaction needs to be verified. Control over one’s personal privacy has never been more accessible, and yet even the most basic societal functions and interactions have never been more necessary.
