National Geographic Channel's CODE BREAKERS Reveals How The Science Of Secrecy Has Shaped The World We Live In Today

Making and Breaking Secret Codes Lies Behind Major Religious, Political and Technological Changes That Continue to Impact Our Lives

"There's always been a battle between people who want to keep secrets and the people who want to get those secrets." - David Kahn, Cryptologist

Code Breakers premieres Sunday, March 1, 2009, at 8 p.m. ET/PT

Secret codes are passed along every second of every day across the world. Every time you use your computer to send an e-mail, use your credit card or phone, you are using codes.  But many of us remain unaware that their development - from simple substitution ciphers to sophisticated messages that require brilliant minds to crack them - began thousands of years ago.  The science of secrecy has played a key part in world events - impacting nations, religion, the outcome of two world wars and the birth of early computing.   

Premiering Sunday, March 1, 2009, at 8 p.m. ET/PT, Code Breakers reveals how cryptology, or the science of secret information, has dramatically changed the course of history and continues to shape our world today.  Featuring experts in code writing and breaking, this one-hour special takes you inside great tales of heroic risks and cat-and-mouse secrecy, where science meets deadly adventure and everyone from monarchs to soldiers to everyday citizens can pay the price.

"There's always been a battle between people who want to keep secrets and the people who want to get those secrets," says David Kahn, author, historian and cryptologist.  "Each time a new type of cipher comes into effect, there's a new method to try to solve that cipher.  Today, however, there are systems which at the present time cannot be solved."

Code Breakers traces the development of cryptology from ancient shift ciphers to modern coded information used in computer technology.  More than 2,000 years ago, Julius Caesar created one of the first known ciphers to communicate with his generals.  He utilized a simple and easily broken "shift cipher" that slid each letter four places, so that "A" became "D" and so on.  Mary, Queen of Scots, used a slightly more ingenious method in her effort to make England a Catholic nation and overthrow her Protestant sister, Queen Elizabeth I.  When Mary was imprisoned, she sent coded messages to her allies that included "nulls," or meaningless symbols, to confound any code breaker.  But Elizabeth employed a cryptographer who analyzed the frequency of letters and nulls and revealed Mary's treasonous objective.  In February 1587, Mary was beheaded, ensuring that England would remain Protestant.

During World War I, code breaking made its mark on a global scale.  The interception and decoding of one encrypted telegram helped change the course of world history.

By 1917, the Germans were using code books comprised of a series of 10,000 words and phrases that were numbered from 0 - 9999.  Then they would add extra digits, creating a so-called double-decker super-encipherment.  When British intelligence intercepted a telegram from Germany's Foreign Secretary Arthur Zimmerman to the German minister in Mexico, they decrypted the words Arizona, Texas and New Mexico.  Germany was proposing that Mexico invade the United States and regain control of those three states.  This telegram helped persuade President Woodrow Wilson to declare war on Germany.

According to Kahn, "The solution of the Zimmerman telegram is probably the most important cryptogram solution of all time.  In effect, it changed the entire history of the 20th century."

During World War II, the Germans developed and refined the Enigma machine, an electric device that produced so many possibilities that, even if you gave the machine to the enemy, they could not, in a reasonable time, decipher any message.  But British intelligence learned to crack the Enigma code using a machine now known as the Bombe, created by a team of scientists that included Alan Turing, a brilliant British mathematician and one of the founding fathers of modern computing.

"It was the necessity of trying to decipher World War II messages that really brought the computer industry to bear and was very much responsible for its development," according to Ryan Garlick, assistant professor, computer science and engineering, University of North Texas.  "The advent of computers changed the nature of code making and breaking.  It's more of a mathematical issue now."

In the past, code makers and breakers needed a shared code-cracking key, but modern computer encryption has made that irrelevant.  Today, everyone who uses a computer to send secure information has a public key and a private key.  This method guarantees that people are who they say they are, and that transactions - like ordering online - haven't been tampered with.  But, as we know from history, codes are really only as secure as the people who make them and use them.

Experts featured in Code Breakers include Ryan Garlick, assistant professor, computer science and engineering, University of North Texas; David Hamer, National Cryptologic Museum (Fort Meade, Md.); David Kahn, author, historian and cryptology expert; Justin Pollard, author, historian and film adviser; and Jean Valentine, World War II decoding machine operator.

Code Breakers is produced for the National Geographic Channel by Fulcrum TV LTD.  For Fulcrum TV LTD, executive producer is Richard Belfield, producer is Jenni Butterworth, and director/writer is Mel Morpeth.  For the National Geographic Channel, executive producer is Michael Welsh, senior vice president of special programming is Michael Cascio and executive vice president of content is Steve Burns.