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Reuben Binns

Building My Own Enigma Machine

Hay Festival 2022, 

The Enigma Machine was an electro-mechanical device used in the mid-20th century to encrypt communications. An ingeniously simple and elegant combination of cogs, wires and lamps, all fitting into a portable case, it provided some of the strongest encryption possible at the time.

In this event Dr Reuben Binns recreates this important development in the history of computing through a project to build an Enigma machine using modern electronics components and digital design techniques. This is followed by a Q&A and a demonstration where you can see the home-made Enigma machine in action and have a go at encrypting and decrypting a message. Reuben Binns is Associate Professor of Human Centred Computing at the University of Oxford.

Reuben Binns