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Kryptos
Artist	Jim Sanborn
Year	1990
Location	George Bush Center for Intelligence, Langley, Virginia
Coordinates	38°57′08″N 77°08′45″W / 38.95227°N 77.14573°W / 38.95227; -77.14573

Kryptos is a distributed sculpture by the American artist Jim Sanborn located on the grounds of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) headquarters, the George Bush Center for Intelligence in Langley, Virginia. Since its dedication on November 3, 1990, there has been much speculation about the meaning of the four encrypted messages it bears. Of these four messages, the first three have been solved, while the fourth message remains one of the most famous unsolved codes in the world. The sculpture continues to be of interest to cryptanalysts, both amateur and professional, who are attempting to decipher the fourth passage. The artist has so far given four clues to this passage.

Description

The main part of the sculpture is located in the northwest corner of the New Headquarters Building courtyard, outside of the Agency's cafeteria. The sculpture comprises four large copper plates with other elements consisting of water, wood, plants, red and green granite, white quartz, and petrified wood. The most prominent feature is a large vertical S-shaped copper screen resembling a scroll or a piece of paper emerging from a computer printer, half of which consists of encrypted text. The characters are all found within the 26 letters of the Latin alphabet, along with question marks, and are cut out of the copper plates. The main sculpture contains four separate enigmatic messages, three of which have been deciphered.

In addition to the main part of the sculpture, Jim Sanborn also placed other pieces of art at the CIA grounds, such as several large granite slabs with sandwiched copper sheets outside the entrance to the New Headquarters Building. Several morse code messages are found on these copper sheets, and one of the stone slabs has an engraving of a compass rose pointing to a lodestone. Other elements of Sanborn's installation include a landscaped garden area, a fish pond with opposing wooden benches, a reflecting pool, and other pieces of stone including a triangle-shaped black stone slab.

The name Kryptos comes from the ancient Greek word for "hidden", and the theme of the sculpture is "Intelligence Gathering".

The cost of the sculpture in 1988 was US$250,000 (worth US$501,000 in 2016).

Encrypted messages

The ciphertext on the left-hand side of the sculpture (as seen from the courtyard) of the main sculpture contains 869 characters in total: 865 letters and 4 question marks.

In April 2006, however, Sanborn released information stating that a letter was omitted from this side of Kryptos "for aesthetic reasons, to keep the sculpture visually balanced". There are also three misspelled words in the plaintext of the deciphered first three passages, which Sanborn has said was intentional, and three letters (YAR) near the beginning of the bottom half of the left side are the only characters on the sculpture in superscript.

The right-hand side of the sculpture comprises a keyed Vigenère encryption tableau, consisting of 867 letters.

One of the lines of the Vigenère tableau has an extra character (L). Bauer, Link, and Molle suggest that this may be a reference to the Hill cipher as an encryption method for the fourth passage of the sculpture. However, Sanborn omitted the extra letter from small Kryptos models that he sold.

EMUFPHZLRFAXYUSDJKZLDKRNSHGNFIVJ
YQTQUXQBQVYUVLLTREVJYQTMKYRDMFD
VFPJUDEEHZWETZYVGWHKKQETGFQJNCE
GGWHKK?DQMCPFQZDQMMIAGPFXHQRLG
TIMVMZJANQLVKQEDAGDVFRPJUNGEUNA
QZGZLECGYUXUEENJTBJLBQCRTBJDFHRR
YIZETKZEMVDUFKSJHKFWHKUWQLSZFTI
HHDDDUVH?DWKBFUFPWNTDFIYCUQZERE
EVLDKFEZMOQQJLTTUGSYQPFEUNLAVIDX
FLGGTEZ?FKZBSFDQVGOGIPUFXHHDRKF
FHQNTGPUAECNUVPDJMQCLQUMUNEDFQ
ELZZVRRGKFFVOEEXBDMVPNFQXEZLGRE
DNQFMPNZGLFLPMRJQYALMGNUVPDXVKP
DQUMEBEDMHDAFMJGZNUPLGEWJLLAETG

 ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZABCD
AKRYPTOSABCDEFGHIJLMNQUVWXZKRYP
BRYPTOSABCDEFGHIJLMNQUVWXZKRYPT
CYPTOSABCDEFGHIJLMNQUVWXZKRYPTO
DPTOSABCDEFGHIJLMNQUVWXZKRYPTOS
ETOSABCDEFGHIJLMNQUVWXZKRYPTOSA
FOSABCDEFGHIJLMNQUVWXZKRYPTOSAB
GSABCDEFGHIJLMNQUVWXZKRYPTOSABC
HABCDEFGHIJLMNQUVWXZKRYPTOSABCD
IBCDEFGHIJLMNQUVWXZKRYPTOSABCDE
JCDEFGHIJLMNQUVWXZKRYPTOSABCDEF
KDEFGHIJLMNQUVWXZKRYPTOSABCDEFG
LEFGHIJLMNQUVWXZKRYPTOSABCDEFGH
MFGHIJLMNQUVWXZKRYPTOSABCDEFGHI

ENDYAHROHNLSRHEOCPTEOIBIDYSHNAIA
CHTNREYULDSLLSLLNOHSNOSMRWXMNE
TPRNGATIHNRARPESLNNELEBLPIIACAE
WMTWNDITEENRAHCTENEUDRETNHAEOE
TFOLSEDTIWENHAEIOYTEYQHEENCTAYCR
EIFTBRSPAMHHEWENATAMATEGYEERLB
TEEFOASFIOTUETUAEOTOARMAEERTNRTI
BSEDDNIAAHTTMSTEWPIEROAGRIEWFEB
AECTDDHILCEIHSITEGOEAOSDDRYDLORIT
RKLMLEHAGTDHARDPNEOHMGFMFEUHE
ECDMRIPFEIMEHNLSSTTRTVDOHW?OBKR
UOXOGHULBSOLIFBBWFLRVQQPRNGKSSO
TWTQSJQSSEKZZWATJKLUDIAWINFBNYP
VTTMZFPKWGDKZXTJCDIGKUHUAUEKCAR

NGHIJLMNQUVWXZKRYPTOSABCDEFGHIJL
OHIJLMNQUVWXZKRYPTOSABCDEFGHIJL
PIJLMNQUVWXZKRYPTOSABCDEFGHIJLM
QJLMNQUVWXZKRYPTOSABCDEFGHIJLMN
RLMNQUVWXZKRYPTOSABCDEFGHIJLMNQ
SMNQUVWXZKRYPTOSABCDEFGHIJLMNQU
TNQUVWXZKRYPTOSABCDEFGHIJLMNQUV
UQUVWXZKRYPTOSABCDEFGHIJLMNQUVW
VUVWXZKRYPTOSABCDEFGHIJLMNQUVWX
WVWXZKRYPTOSABCDEFGHIJLMNQUVWXZ
XWXZKRYPTOSABCDEFGHIJLMNQUVWXZK
YXZKRYPTOSABCDEFGHIJLMNQUVWXZKR
ZZKRYPTOSABCDEFGHIJLMNQUVWXZKRY
 ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZABCD

Sanborn worked with a retiring CIA employee named Ed Scheidt, Chairman of the CIA Office of Communications, to come up with the cryptographic systems used on the sculpture.

Sanborn has revealed that the sculpture contains a riddle within a riddle, which will be solvable only after the four encrypted passages have been deciphered. He has given conflicting information about the sculpture's answer, saying at one time that he gave the complete solution to the then-CIA director William Webster during the dedication ceremony; but later, he also said that he had not given Webster the entire solution. He did, however, confirm that a passage of the plaintext of the second message reads, "Who knows the exact location? Only WW."

Sanborn also confirmed that should he die before the entire sculpture is deciphered, someone should be able to confirm the solution. In 2020, Sanborn stated that he planned to put the secret to the solution up for auction once he died.

Solvers

The first person to announce publicly that he had solved the first three passages was Jim Gillogly, a computer scientist from southern California, who deciphered these passages using a computer, and revealed his solutions in 1999. After Gillogly's announcement, the CIA revealed that their analyst David Stein had solved the same passages in 1998 using pencil and paper techniques, although at the time of his solution the information was only disseminated within the intelligence community. No public announcement was made until July 1999, although in November 1998 it was revealed that "a CIA analyst working on his own time solved the lion's share of it".

The NSA claimed that some of their employees had solved the same three passages but would not reveal names or dates until March 2000, when it was learned that an NSA team led by Ken Miller, along with Dennis McDaniels and two other unnamed individuals, had solved passages 1–3 in late 1992. In 2013, in response to a Freedom of Information Act request by Elonka Dunin, the NSA released documents that show these attempts to solve the Kryptos puzzle in 1992, following a challenge by Bill Studeman, then Deputy Director of the CIA. The documents show that by June 1993, a small group of NSA cryptanalysts had succeeded in solving the first three passages of the sculpture.

The above attempts to solve Kryptos all had found that passage 2 ended with WESTIDBYROWS. However, in 2005, Dr Nicole Friedrich, a logician from Vancouver, Canada, determined that another possible plaintext was: WESTXLAYERTWO. Dr. Friedrich solved the ending to section K2 from a clue that became apparent after she had determined a running cipher of K4 that resulted in an incomplete but partially legible K4 plaintext, involving text such as XPIST, REALIZE, AYD EQ HR, and others, but the find that instigated her discovery of K2 plaintext was the clue WESTX.

On April 19, 2006, Sanborn contacted an online community dedicated to the Kryptos puzzle to inform them that what was once the accepted solution to passage 2 was incorrect. Sanborn said that he made an error in the sculpture by omitting an S in the ciphertext (an X in the plaintext), and he confirmed that the last passage of the plaintext was WESTXLAYERTWO, and not WESTIDBYROWS.

Solutions

The following are the solutions of passages 1–3 of the sculpture.

Misspellings present in the text are included verbatim.

Solution of passage 1

Method: Vigenère

Keywords: Kryptos, Palimpsest

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

Iqlusion was an intentional misspelling of illusion.

Solution of passage 2

Method: Vigenère

Keywords: Kryptos, Abscissa

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

The coordinates mentioned in the plaintext, 38°57′6.5″N 77°8′44″W / 38.951806°N 77.14556°W / 38.951806; -77.14556, have been interpreted using a modern Geodetic datum as indicating a point that is approximately 174 feet (53 meters) southeast of the sculpture.

Solution of passage 3

Method: Transposition

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 ?

This is a paraphrased quotation from Howard Carter's account of the opening of the tomb of Tutankhamun on November 26, 1922, as described in his 1923 book The Tomb of Tutankhamun. The question with which it ends is asked by Lord Carnarvon, to which Carter (in the book) replied "wonderful things". On November 26, 1922, Field notes from the expedition, however, show his reply as, "Yes, it is wonderful".

Clues given for passage 4

When commenting in 2006 about his error in passage 2, Sanborn said that the answers to the first three passages contain clues to the fourth passage. In November 2010, Sanborn released a clue, publicly stating that "NYPVTT", the 64th–⁠69th letters in passage four, become "BERLIN" after decryption.

Sanborn gave The New York Times another clue in November 2014: the letters "MZFPK", the 70th–⁠74th letters in passage four, become "CLOCK" after decryption. The 74th letter is K in both the plaintext and ciphertext, meaning that it is possible for a character to encrypt to itself. This means it does not have the weakness, where a character could never be encrypted as itself, that was known to be inherent in the German Enigma machine.

Sanborn further stated that in order to solve passage 4, "You'd better delve into that particular clock," but added, "There are several really interesting clocks in Berlin." The particular clock in question is presumably the Berlin Clock, although the Alexanderplatz World Clock and Clock of Flowing Time are other candidates.

In an article published on January 29, 2020, by the New York Times, Sanborn gave another clue: at positions 26–34, ciphertext "QQPRNGKSS" is the word "NORTHEAST".

In August 2020, Sanborn revealed that the four letters in positions 22–25, ciphertext "FLRV", in the plaintext are "EAST". Sanborn commented that he "released this layout to several people as early as April". The first person known to have shared this hint more widely was Sukhwant Singh.

Related sculptures

Kryptos was the first cryptographic sculpture made by Sanborn. After producing Kryptos, he went on to make several other sculptures with codes and other types of writing, including one entitled Antipodes, which is at the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington, D.C.; an "Untitled Kryptos Piece" that was sold to a private collector; and Cyrillic Projector, which contains encrypted Russian Cyrillic text that included an extract from a classified KGB document.

The cipher on one side of Antipodes repeats the text from Kryptos. Much of the cipher on Antipodes' other side is duplicated on Cyrillic Projector. The Russian portion of the cipher found on Cyrillic Projector and Antipodes was solved in 2003 by Frank Corr and Mike Bales independently from each other, with translation from Russian plaintext provided by Elonka Dunin.

As part of its 1994–1997 renovations, Sanborn was commissioned to create a sculpture. The sculpture is entitled Ex Nexum; it was installed in 1997 at Little Rock Old US Post Office & Courthouse. Some additional sculptures by Sanborn include Native American texts: Rippowam that was installed at the University of Connecticut in Stamford in 1999, while Lux was installed in 2001 at an old US Post Office building in Fort Myers, Florida. Iacto is located at the University of Iowa, between the Adler Journalism Building and Main Library.

In popular culture

The dust jacket of the US version of Dan Brown's 2003 novel The Da Vinci Code contains two references to Kryptos—one on the back cover (coordinates printed light red on dark red, vertically next to the blurbs) is a reference to the coordinates mentioned in the plaintext of passage 2, except the degree digit is off by one. When Brown and his publisher were asked about this, they both gave the same reply: "The discrepancy is intentional". The coordinates were part of the first clue of the second Da Vinci Code WebQuest, the first answer being Kryptos. The other reference is hidden in the brown "tear" artwork—upside-down words which say "Only WW knows", which is another reference to the second message on Kryptos.

Kryptos was featured in Dan Brown's 2009 novel The Lost Symbol.

A small version of Kryptos appears in the season 5 episode of Alias "S.O.S.". In it, Marshall Flinkman says he has cracked the code just by looking at it during a tour visit to the CIA office. The solution he describes sounds like the solution to the first two parts.

Kryptos features prominently in City Spies: City Of The Dead, a 2023 book by James Ponti that is the fourth book in the City Spies series. References to the sculpture are found in a message that the City Spies team deciphers early in the story, leading the team to travel to Berlin.

See also

• Copiale cipher
• History of cryptography
• Voynich manuscript

Notes

1. ^ "Kryptos sculpture". Central Intelligence Agency. Intellipedia. July 18, 2017. Freedom of Information Act Electronic Reading Room. Archived from the original on January 7, 2024. Retrieved January 7, 2024.
2. ^ Burstein, Daniel; Keijzer, Arne de (December 22, 2009). Secrets of The Lost Symbol. William Morrow. ISBN 978-0061964954.
3. ^ "FAQ About Kryptos". elonka.com. Elonka.com. December 14, 2003. Archived from the original on April 21, 2024. Retrieved November 12, 2011.
4. ^ Zetter, Kim (April 20, 2006). "Typo Confounds Kryptos Sleuths". Wired. Archived from the original on March 4, 2024.
5. Bauer, Craig; Link, Gregory; Molle, Dante (April 27, 2016). "James Sanborn's Kryptos and the matrix encryption conjecture". Cryptologia. 40 (6): 548. doi:10.1080/01611194.2016.1141556. ISSN 0161-1194.
6. ^ Champagne, Christine; Beebe, Drew (July 25, 2020). "This sculpture at CIA headquarters holds one of the world's most famous unsolved mysteries". edition.cnn.com. CNN. Archived from the original on March 14, 2024. Retrieved July 25, 2020.
7. Zetter, Kim (January 20, 2005). "Questions for Kryptos' Creator". Wired. ISSN 1059-1028. Archived from the original on April 24, 2023. Retrieved May 5, 2024.
8. ^ Schwartz, John; Corum, Jonathan (January 29, 2020). "This Sculpture Holds a Decades-Old C.I.A. Mystery. And Now, Another Clue". New York Times. Archived from the original on May 4, 2024.
9. Markoff, John (June 16, 1999). "CIA's Artistic Enigma Reveals All but Final Clues". New York Times. Archived from the original on October 20, 2023. Retrieved December 11, 2011.
10. Stein, David D. (1999). "The Puzzle at CIA Headquarters: Cracking the Courtyard Crypto" (PDF). Studies in Intelligence. 43 (1).
11. Stein, David D. (July 23, 2018). "Cracking the Courtyard Crypto". CIA. Freedom of Information Act Electronic Reading Room. Archived from the original on January 7, 2024. Retrieved January 7, 2024.
12. Schwartz, John (July 19, 1999). "Cracking the Code of a CIA Sculpture". Washington Post. Archived from the original on June 16, 2016. Retrieved December 11, 2011.
13. Zetter, Kim (June 5, 2013). "CIA Releases Analyst's Fascinating Tale of Cracking the Kryptos Sculpture". Wired. Wired.com. Archived from the original on January 17, 2024. Retrieved June 5, 2013.
14. Bessonette, Colin (November 16, 1998). "Q&A on the News". The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. p. A2. A CIA analyst working on his own time has solved the lion's share of it, but it hasn't been completely decoded, CIA spokesman Mark Mansfield told Q&A. He said the best way to describe the sculpture is to say it incorporates natural building materials native to America and includes an encoded copper screen. When and if someone completely solves the message, a decision will be made about releasing it to the public, "but we're not at that point yet," Mansfield said.
15. Bowman, Tom (March 17, 2000). "Unlocking the secret of 'Kryptos'". The Baltimore Sun. Archived from the original on February 9, 2014. Retrieved December 11, 2011.
16. ^ Zetter, Kim (July 10, 2013). "Documents Reveal How the NSA Cracked the Kryptos Sculpture Years Before the CIA". Wired. Archived from the original on May 10, 2023. Retrieved April 10, 2020.
17. Sadowski, Jathan (July 11, 2013). "NSA Cracked Kryptos Before the CIA. What Other Mysteries Has It Solved?". Slate. Archived from the original on February 4, 2024.
18. "From a radio interview on BellCoreRadio, season 1, episode 32, Barcode Brothers". SarenaSix. Quoted from Elonka Dunin. October 11, 2005. Archived from the original on October 19, 2015. Retrieved November 12, 2011.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
19. Zetter, Kim (November 20, 2014). "Finally, a New Clue to Solve the CIA's Mysterious Kryptos Sculpture". Wired. Archived from the original on January 6, 2015. Retrieved November 25, 2014. in 2006, Sanborn realized he had also made an inadvertent error, a missing "x" that he mistakenly deleted from the end of a line in passage 2, a passage that was already solved.
20. Lindsly, Corey (June 16, 1999). "fx-discuss: FC: Cypherpunk breaks CIA's crypto code in 1990 statue (fwd)". elonka.com. Archived from the original on September 5, 2023. Retrieved November 12, 2011.
21. Malek, Jaromir (May 15, 2006). Hutchison, Sue; Miles, Elizabeth; Magee, Diana; Rawlinson, Kent; Allen, Lindsay; Hobby, Alison; Malek, Jaromir (eds.). "Tutankhamun: Anatomy of an Excavation". ashmolean.org. Designed by Jonathan Moffett. Griffith Institute.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
22. Schwartz, John (November 20, 2010). "Artist releases clue to Kryptos". The New York Times. Archived from the original on April 19, 2023. Retrieved November 12, 2011.
23. (anonymous) (November 22, 2010). "'Kryptos' Sculptor Drops New Clue In 20-Year Mystery". National Public Radio. Archived from the original on February 24, 2024. Retrieved November 12, 2011.
24. "A New Clue to 'Kryptos'". The New York Times. Photos by Drew Angerer. November 20, 2014. Archived from the original on March 14, 2024. Retrieved November 21, 2014.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
25. Schwartz, John (November 20, 2014). "Sculptor Offers Another Clue in 24-Year-Old Mystery at C.I.A.". The New York Times. New York Times. Archived from the original on February 24, 2024. Retrieved November 22, 2014.
26. Schwartz, John (August 24, 2020). "KRYPTOS NEWS: Jim Sanborn, creator of the Kryptos sculpture, quietly released four new plaintext letters to the unsolved potion, K4. EAST, which goes just before the recently released NORTHEAST. Here's my story from January" (Tweet). Archived from the original on March 14, 2024. Retrieved May 5, 2024 – via Twitter.
27. Cyrillic Riddle Solved Science. Vol. 302, October 10, 2003. p. 224.
28. "Old Post Office and Courthouse, Little Rock, AR". U.S. General Services Administration. Archived from the original on February 4, 2024. Retrieved May 5, 2024.
29. "127. UConn Public Art Collection (8 of 30)". CT Museum Quest. Archived from the original on April 20, 2023.
30. "Jim Sanborn: The Artist's Official Site". jimsanborn.net. KRYPTOS. Archived from the original on January 17, 2024.
31. "Iacto | Facilities Management". Facilities Management. The University of Iowa. Archived from the original on January 2, 2021. Retrieved January 13, 2022.
32. McKinnon, John D. (May 27, 2005). "CIA sculpture 'kryptos' draws mystery lovers". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Archived from the original on February 17, 2007. Retrieved December 11, 2011.

References

Books

• Jonathan Binstock and Jim Sanborn (2003). Atomic Time: Pure Science and Seduction. Corcoran Gallery of Art. ISBN 0-88675-072-5. (contains 1–2 pages about Kryptos)
• Dunin, Elonka (2006). The Mammoth Book of Secret Codes and Cryptograms. Constable & Robinson. p. 500. ISBN 0-7867-1726-2.
• Dunin, Elonka (2009). "Kryptos: The Unsolved Enigma". In Daniel Burstein; Arne de Keijzer (eds.). Secrets of the Lost Symbol: The Unauthorized Guide to the Mysteries Behind The Da Vinci Code Sequel. HarperCollins. pp. 319–326. ISBN 978-0-06-196495-4.
• Dunin, Elonka (2009). "Art, Encryption, and the Preservation of Secrets: An interview with Jim Sanborn". In Daniel Burstein; Arne de Keijzer (eds.). Secrets of the Lost Symbol: The Unauthorized Guide to the Mysteries Behind The Da Vinci Code Sequel. HarperCollins. pp. 294–300. ISBN 978-0-06-196495-4.
• Taylor, Greg (2009). "Decoding Kryptos". In John Weber (ed.). Illustrated Guide to the Lost Symbol. Simon & Schuster. ISBN 978-1-4165-2366-6.

Journal articles

• Bauer, Craig; Link, Gregory; Molle, Dante (2016). "James Sanborn's Kryptos and the matrix encryption conjecture". Cryptologia. 40 (5): 541–552. doi:10.1080/01611194.2016.1141556. S2CID 26592088.

Conference papers

• Bean, Richard (2021). Cryptodiagnosis of "Kryptos K4". 4th International Conference on Historical Cryptology HistoCrypt. doi:10.3384/ecp183153.

Articles

• Kryptos 1,735 Alphabetical letters
• "Gillogly Cracks CIA Art", & "The Kryptos Code Unmasked", 1999, New York Times and Cypherpunks archive
• "Unlocking the secret of Kryptos", March 17, 2000, Sun Journal
• "Solving the Enigma of Kryptos", January 26, 2005, Wired, by Kim Zetter
• "Interest grows in solving cryptic CIA puzzle after link to Da Vinci Code", June 11, 2005, The Guardian
• "Cracking the Code", June 19, 2005, CNN
• Mission Impossible: The Code Even the CIA Can't Crack

External links

• Jim Sanborn's official Kryptos webpage by Jim Sanborn
• Kryptos website maintained by Elonka Dunin (includes Kryptos FAQ, transcript, pictures and links)
• Kryptos photos by Jim Gillogly
• Washington Post: Cracking the Code of a CIA Sculpture
• Wired : Documents Reveal How the NSA Cracked the Kryptos Sculpture Years Before the CIA
• PBS : Segment (Video) on Kryptos from Nova ScienceNow
• The General Services Administration Kryptos webpage
• The General Services Administration Ex Nexum webpage
• The General Services Administration Indian Run webpage
• The General Services Administration Binary Systems webpage
• The Central Intelligence Agency Kryptos webpage
• The National Security Agency Kryptos webpage Archived 2017-09-12 at the Wayback Machine
• The Kryptos Project by Julie (Jew-Lee) Irena Lann
• Nicole (Monet) Friedrich's Kryptos Observations
• Patrick Foster's Kryptos page
• A practical introduction to brute-force decryption of Kryptos passages 1–3

• 1990 establishments in Virginia
• 1990 sculptures
• Buildings and structures in Fairfax County, Virginia
• Central Intelligence Agency
• Copper sculptures in the United States
• Granite sculptures in Virginia
• History of cryptography
• McLean, Virginia
• Outdoor sculptures in Virginia
• Riddles
• Sculptures by Jim Sanborn
• Stone sculptures in Virginia
• Undeciphered historical codes and ciphers
• Wooden sculptures in the United States