This sculpture at CIA headquarters holds one of the world’s most famous unsolved mysteries

July 25, 2020

In the late 1980s, artist Jim Sanborn was commissioned to create a sculpture that will be on display at CIA Headquarters in Langley, Virginia. Knowing that some of the world’s top intelligence officials would see the work virtually every day, Sanborn has produced a work of art that is, in a word, bewildering.

Unveiled on November 3, 1990, it’s called Kryptos, and it contains a crypto challenge. Sure, someone would crack the code in just a few weeks, Sanborn thought.

But no one did. And, today, Kryptos remains one of the world’s most famous unsolved mysteries.
“I didn’t think it would last that long – thirty years – without being deciphered,” Sanborn said.

Kryptos sits in a courtyard outside the CIA headquarters. A winding copper screen measuring 12 feet high and 20 feet wide, the sculpture is filled with letters. “I cut almost 2,000 letters by hand with jigsaws,” says Sanborn.

The text that covers the sculpture looks like gibberish to the untrained eye, but Kryptos contains four separate, coded messages that together form an enigma, according to Sanborn.

Sanborn had no experience in the art of writing code before creating Kryptos. And he wasn’t particularly good at math.

“So I had to turn to someone. Was it going to be the Soviets? Was it going to be the Mossad? Was it going to be another intelligence agency? he cracks. “I crossed them almost all because it probably wouldn’t end well. ”

The artist eventually sought advice from Edward Scheidt, an expert in cryptology and encryption who had served as chairman of the CIA’s crypto center before retiring.

He became an expert

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We met more or less in secret, and he educated me on the subject of code, modern codes, contemporary coding systems – at least contemporary in 88, ”says Sanborn.

Using what he learned from Scheidt, Sanborn composed coded text messages to embed into Kryptos using various techniques, including templates and matrices.

“I wanted it to reveal itself like the peeling of the layers of an onion,” he says of the mystery etched in Kryptos.

Three of the encoded messages have been deciphered over the years by members of the NSA, the CIA and the general public.

But more onion needs to be peeled.

What the messages read

The first message reads: “Between the subtle shadows and the absence of light lies the shade of iqlusion. ”

“Iqlusion” is not a typo. Sanborn intentionally misspelled the word “illusion”. It was his way of rejecting people.

The second post, which also contains a spelling error, shares the latitude and longitude coordinates for the CIA, hints that something is buried there, and refers to “WW”.

The initials are a nod to William Webster. He was the head of the CIA in 1990 when Kryptos was installed.

The third message borrows from the writings of archaeologist Howard Carter on the opening of the door to King Tut’s tomb.

So what does all this mean?

It is still a mystery. We’ll be one step closer when someone finally decodes the code behind the fourth message.

There are many who think so, but according to Sanborn, no one has yet.

“I have a person who contacts me once a week at exactly the same second – I think it’s Tuesday at 8:23 am – with a decryption, and this person has been doing it for two and a half years,” says Sanborn.

People who try to break it

Cryptologist has been trying to solve Kryptos for 20 years

Sanborn has come to know some of the people who are working to solve Kryptos. He admires Elonka Dunin’s efforts and says that she “probably knows more about Kryptos than I know”.

Dunin, a cryptologist and video game developer, first heard of Kryptos in late 2000. She loves solving puzzles, but she knew she couldn’t figure out Kryptos on her own.

She created a website dedicated to code. It has become a network of people committed to a common goal.

“Our Kryptos community is made up of people all over the world. We have thousands of people who are interested in Kryptos – either cracking it or helping to see it cracked, ”she says. “Some of them are professional code breakers. Some of them are students. “

Code breakers meet regularly

Dunin hosts events where code breakers can grill Sanborn and Scheidt in person. They usually meet every two years at a restaurant or studio in Sanborn, Maryland.

Sanborn appreciates the group’s enthusiasm, especially since there is no reward for solving Kryptos beyond bragging rights.

However, he doesn’t make it easy for anyone.

Over the years, Sanborn has publicly shared three one-word clues from the elusive Fourth Passage – “clock,” “Berlin,” and, most recently, “northeast” – to aid the process.

But that’s all.

It remains unresolved

Dunin can’t predict exactly when this will happen. But she believes Kryptos will be solved someday. “I personally would feel a tremendous sense of relief. It would be off my plate, ”says Dunin.

And she doesn’t care who finds out at this point. “It doesn’t have to be me,” she stresses. “I want to see it resolved. ”

Does Sanborn, who keeps the solution to Kryptos hidden in a safe, think it will be resolved? Does he even want this resolved?

“I wouldn’t be upset if this ended tomorrow,” Sanborn said to himself. “Maybe I would be relieved.

MMW