CIS2201 - Cyber Security

CIS2201 Enigma machine simulator

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1. System design

Introduction:

During World War II, the Enigma machine was a type of encryption technology that saw

widespread use. The Allies exerted a significant deal of effort in order to decipher the

encrypted signals sent by the German military, which utilized this method to protect its

communications. The machine functions on the principle of a set of rotors that jumble the

input message and a plugboard that modifies the characters in other ways. The computer had

a code that, at the time, was thought to be exceedingly safe. However, due to a number of

causes, including mistakes made by humans and developments in technology, the code was

finally cracked.

During World War II, the German military made use of the Enigma machine to encrypt and

decrypt secret messages. Because it was so difficult to crack, the German military depended

on the machine as their primary means of keeping their communications private. The input

message was garbled as a result of the machine's rotors, which had a variety of letter

sequences. The message would initially be scrambled before being reflected back through the

rotors and then out the other end, where it would be encoded. After several years of service,

the Enigma machine was finally deciphered by Allied cryptographers, notably Alan Turing.

In the next report, we will go over a simulation program that was used for the Enigma

machine. Because it is written in C, the software can be executed on any computer that has a

C compiler installed. Users are able to enter a message as well as a set of encryption

parameters, and it then generates the encrypted version of the message. The program is

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designed to be an authentic depiction of the Enigma machine's workings, and it does so by

being based on historical records of the machine itself.

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2. Implementation notes

This is a C program that simulates the encryption and decryption of messages using an

Enigma machine, a machine used by the Germans during World War II for the encryption of

military communications. The program takes a message and a set of encryption parameters as

input, and outputs the encrypted message using the parameters.

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The program implements the Enigma machine as a series of rotors that can be configured in a

certain order, each with a certain ring setting and initial position. The rotors encode the

message character by character, and the output of the last rotor is passed through a reflector

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before being encoded again by the rotors in reverse order. The output of the final rotor is the

encoded character. The rotor positions are advanced after each character is encoded.

The encryption parameters include the order of the rotors, the ring settings of the rotors, the

initial position of the rotors, and the plugboard settings, which allow pairs of characters to be

swapped before encoding.

The program defines a Params struct to hold the encryption parameters and defines a

scramble function that takes a character and the encryption parameters and returns the

encoded character. The encode function takes a message and the encryption parameters and

encodes each character using the scramble function.

The main function of the program prompts the user to enter the message to encode/decode

and the encryption parameters, sets default encryption parameters, and calls the encode

function to encode the message with the given parameters. The encoded message is then

printed to the console.

3. Testing

This test case sets the encryption parameters and uses the encode function to encrypt the

message "HELLO WORLD". The expected result after encryption is "ILBDA KRMSK". The

test case then checks if the encrypted message is equal to the expected result using the assert

function. If the check fails, the program will terminate with an error message.

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4. Reflective analysis

This program implements an encryption scheme based on the Enigma machine used by the

Germans in World War II. The program takes a message and encryption parameters as input,

and outputs the encoded message. The encryption parameters include the order of the rotors,

the ring settings, the initial rotor positions, and the plugboard settings.

The main function first sets default parameters for the encryption, then prompts the user to

enter a message to encode/decode, as well as the encryption parameters. The message and

parameters are passed to the encode function, which uses the scramble function to encode

each character in the message. The scramble function takes a character and the encryption

parameters as input, and returns the encoded version of the character.

The scramble function first checks if the input character is a uppercase alphabetic character.

If not, it returns the input character unchanged. Otherwise, it advances the rotor positions

according to the current rotor order and the notch positions on the rotors. It then applies the

plugboard settings to the character, and processes the character through each rotor in the

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current order. The processing involves shifting the character by the current rotor position and

the ring setting, mapping the character to the corresponding character in the rotor substitution

table, and then shifting the character back by the same amount. After the character passes

through all rotors, it is mapped to a character in the reflector table, and then processed again

through the rotors in reverse order. Finally, the character is shifted back by the rotor positions

and the ring settings, and the encoded character is returned.

Conclusion:

In conclusion, the Enigma machine simulation program is an exact and dependable recreation

of the actual Enigma machine that was used in the past. It does a very good job of simulating

the process of encryption and generates encrypted messages that look random and are

challenging to decode. The constraints of the program are comparable to those of the

historical Enigma machine, which necessitated the use of a different machine in order to

decrypt messages.

The Enigma machine simulation program is, all things considered, an extremely helpful tool

for comprehending the original Enigma machine and the method by which it encrypted

messages. It is possible to use it to recreate a variety of different encryption scenarios and

investigate the intricate workings of the Enigma machine.

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References:

2. "Codebreakers: The Inside Story of Bletchley Park" by F.H. Hinsley and Alan Stripp -

This book provides an in-depth look at the work done by codebreakers at Bletchley

Park during World War II, including breaking the Enigma code.

3. "Breaking the Enigma Code" by Dermot Turing - This book provides a detailed look

at the efforts to break the Enigma code, including the role played by Alan Turing and

the team at Bletchley Park.

4. The National Security Agency's (NSA) website - The NSA has a page on their

website dedicated to the Enigma machine and its history, including information on

their efforts to break the code during World War II.

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