Crypto Explained The Columnar Transposition Cipher

SKILL LEVEL REQUIRED: BEGINNER

Introduction
Cryptography can be hard, but when you break it down to the basic steps (transposition, substitution
etc.) it can become a lot easier. While this document wont teach you how to decode a message
encrypted in AES256, it will give you an understanding of one of its low tech predecessors

Columnar Transposition Cipher

This type of crypto is generally encrypted and decrypted by hand (although there are various scripts
and apps that will help you along). All you basically need is a keyword to use and the message to
encrypt.

Step 1 Select the keyword you wish to use

The keyword will determine the number of columns you will use in the encryption process. The
length of the keyword doesnt necessarily increase the strength of the cipher. In fact, this is a fairly
weak cipher and can be decrypted by someone who is aware of basic decryption techniques,
however it is a good place to start learning a simple crypto system.
For this demonstration we will use the keyword: MESSAGE

Step 2 Your message

This is the message that you will transform from plaintext (message in unencrypted format) to cipher
text (message in encrypted format). To make it easy to start with we will use a short message:
This is my secret message

Step 3 Encoding your message

You can do this in a number of ways, either with a word processor or a sheet of paper. First of all,
create a table with the number of columns equal to the number of letters in your keyword

Type your keyword in the table with each letter being in a different column

Next, start entering the letters of your secret message under each column heading in the keyword
table, i.e. under the M column enter T, under the E column enter H, under the first S column enter I
and so on and so on (note: for this purpose, ignore any spaces or punctuation in your message, just
worry about the letters).

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The end table should look like this

M
T
Y
M

E
H
S
E

S
I
E
S

S
S
C
S

A
I
R
A

G
S
E
G

E
M
T
E

Step 4 Extracting your cipher text

From each column starting at the top and working down (ignoring the row that contains your
keyword), write out the text you have grouping each of the columns together and separated by a
space. You should get the following:
TYM HSE IES SCS IRA SEG MTE
This is your encoded message

Step 5 Transmitting the message

To decode the message, you need to know the keyword. If you were sending this to someone you
would need to ensure that they either already knew the keyword you were going to use or you sent
the keyword using a different communications channel.

Notes
The message is now encoded and unless you know the keyword length, it will be difficult for anyone
to decode it (remember, there are techniques to do this, this is not a terribly secure crypto system).
There are ways to make this more secure, but I will cover this in a later document. A very simple
method you could apply to this would be to put the letters of the keyword in alphabetical order
before you extracted the cipher text. Then if anyone managed to get the keyword and the cipher
text, they would need to work out the keyword before the message would make any sense.
Obviously if you were going to do this you would want to pick a more complex keyword and one that
could have a number of different anagrams made from it.
If you dont have enough letters to fill all the columns of your keyword, you can add what is called
padding to your message. Padding can be any series of letters, usually the same, which wont relate
to the message but will just be used to fill out space. Commonly the letter X is used but it can be any
letter.

Exercise
Here is an exercise to test your skill. The keyword has been scrambled and there is padding used.
Good luck!
KEYWORD: CONEYPRINT
MESSAGE: ANWHE RTHUX CAOGB ITWUD UCNIA NRDTR NDATH EPTOX SOOLX DYIWD

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