Introducing Cryptography

Introducing Cryptography

• Meet Alice, Bob and Eve;
• See an overview of the process of exchanging secret keys in public;
• See a simple and more complex cipher algorithm working together;
• See how visual cryptography works.
• Learn and discuss some key words and concepts:
  • cyptography,
  • encryption,
  • decryption;
  • public-keys and key exchange;
  • ciphers: substitution ciphers
  • digital signatures

1. In a practical way, the protocols of symmetric and asymmetric cryptographic systems;
2. What a key is, and how they can be exchanged - in secret;
3. How to use and understand a simple substitution or shift cipher (Caesar’s Cipher);
4. How to use a more complex piece of visual cryptography and consider how it was made;
5. A brief overview of how easy encryption techniques are made hard, with mathematics.

This session is designed for Key Stage 3.