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Unsolved Codes

The Kryptos sculpture was made by artist Jim Sanborn and dedicated to the CIA. It has been on the grounds of the CIA in Langley, Virginia since November 3rd, 1990. The sculpture has a total of 4 encrypted messages. Over the last decades only three of the four messages have been confirmed to being solved. Jim Sanborn worked with retired Chairman of the CIA Office of Communications Edward Scheidt to come up with the cryptographic systems. It has been revealed that the sculpture contains a riddle within a riddle and can only be solved all together. Not even the brightest minds of the CIA have been able to crack the fourth message. The sculpture continues to be the main focus of many amateur and professional cryptoanalysts. Sanborn has said that if he dies before the fourth message is deciphered someone else will be able to confirm the solution.

“Hidden”

Kryptos comes from the ancient Greek word for “hidden”. The overall theme of the sculpture is “Intelligence Gathering”. The main sculpture is exactly located right outside the cafeteria of the northwest corner of the New Headquarters Building. It is made of four large copper plates including other elements such as water, plants, wood, quarts and granite. It has a large S-shape copper screen that looks like a scroll. All the characters are found within the Latin alphabet and are cut out of the copper plates. Jim Sanborn has also placed other pieces of his art around the CIA grounds containing Morse code and engravings.

Solutions So Far

Here are the solutions confirmed to being solved for the first three sections of the sculpture. Misspellings found are how the messages were written word for word. Sanborn has provided multiple clues to solving the fourth message including that “the answers to the first three sections contain clues to the fourth section“. In 2010 he released the word “Berlin” and in 2014 the word “Clock”. Following he released two statements “You’d better delve into that particular clock,” “There are several really interesting clocks in Berlin”.

Section 1

“BETWEEN SUBTLE SHADING AND THE ABSENCE OF LIGHT LIES THE NUANCE OF IQLUSION”

Section 2

“IT WAS TOTALLY INVISIBLE HOWS THAT POSSIBLE ? THEY USED THE EARTHS MAGNETIC FIELD X THE INFORMATION WAS GATHERED AND TRANSMITTED UNDERGRUUND TO AN UNKNOWN LOCATION X DOES LANGLEY KNOW ABOUT THIS ? THEY SHOULD ITS BURIED OUT THERE SOMEWHERE X WHO KNOWS THE EXACT LOCATION ? ONLY WW THIS WAS HIS LAST MESSAGE X THIRTY EIGHT DEGREES FIFTY SEVEN MINUTES SIX POINT FIVE SECONDS NORTH SEVENTY SEVEN DEGREES EIGHT MINUTES FORTY FOUR SECONDS WEST X LAYER TWO”

Section 3

“SLOWLY DESPARATLY SLOWLY THE REMAINS OF PASSAGE DEBRIS THAT ENCUMBERED THE LOWER PART OF THE DOORWAY WAS REMOVED WITH TREMBLING HANDS I MADE A TINY BREACH IN THE UPPER LEFT HAND CORNER AND THEN WIDENING THE HOLE A LITTLE I INSERTED THE CANDLE AND PEERED IN THE HOT AIR ESCAPING FROM THE CHAMBER CAUSED THE FLAME TO FLICKER BUT PRESENTLY DETAILS OF THE ROOM WITHIN EMERGED FROM THE MIST X CAN YOU SEE ANYTHING Q ?

Section 4

To be solved.