back to article WW2 German Enigma machine auctioned for record-breaking price

A three-rotor Engima machine was sold for a record $269,000 at a Bonhams auction earlier this week. The machine is in complete working condition and was manufactured for the German military in Berlin in July 1944. The Enigma machines were, for their time, sophisticated encryption devices, and were used to encrypt Morse-coded …

  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    also known as one hundred and eighty thousand quid (£180,000)

  2. frank ly

    "... after being posted, bizarrely, to Jeremy Paxman."

    He did have a reputation for working tirelessly and ruthlessly at 'cracking' interviewees.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: "... after being posted, bizarrely, to Jeremy Paxman."

      Nah,

      they thought "this typewriter just prints bollocks" and decided it must be his as that's what he spouts most of the time

    2. GoldenToast

      Re: "... after being posted, bizarrely, to Jeremy Paxman."

      It could have been worse...

      ... they could have sent it to Stephen Fry

  3. Bluewhelk

    You're thinking of Lorenz

    This is a common mistake

    "The enormous efforts undertaken to break Enigma-encrypted messages by the British at Bletchley Park, particularly the efforts of Alan Turing, pioneered much of what now stands as the basis for computer science."

    The enigma codes were broken on an industrial scale using the "Bombe" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptanalysis_of_the_Enigma#British_bombe), clever as they were I don't think the Bombe has ever been accused of being the basis of modern computing.

    However the colossus (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colossus_computer) which was designed by Tommy Flowers to crack the Lorenz teleprinter encryption is another matter.

    1. A Non e-mouse Silver badge
      Pint

      Re: You're thinking of Lorenz

      Whilst the work that Turing, Flowers, et al did at Bletchley was amazing, some of the early work in cracking German codes was actually done by the Polish: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptanalysis_of_the_Enigma#Polish_breakthrough.

      Several beers to all those involved.

      1. Bloakey1

        Re: You're thinking of Lorenz

        "Whilst the work that Turing, Flowers, et al did at Bletchley was amazing, some of the early work in cracking German codes was actually done by the Polish:"

        <snip>

        The poles were the first to take it seriously and they did a lot of the ground work along with the French. Vera Atkins did a lot in trying to get the poles smuggled out to France and thence to the UK but was thwarted by British bureaucracy. They did eventually get here and were a very important part of the setup and their contribution should never be forgotten or belittled.

    2. Terry Barnes

      Re: You're thinking of Lorenz

      "clever as they were I don't think the Bombe has ever been accused of being the basis of modern computing."

      Not the Bombe, Turing's work. His work to determine if a problem was solvable and thus computable is the basis of computer science. The use of the principle of explosion in the logic of the Bombe is pretty fundamental.

      1. Bloakey1

        Re: You're thinking of Lorenz

        "Not the Bombe, Turing's work. His work to determine if a problem was solvable and thus computable is the basis of computer science. The use of the principle of explosion in the logic of the Bombe is pretty fundamental."

        Hi work on "Computable numbers with an application to the 'Einscheidungsproblem'". is one of the foundations of computer science, the concept of the Turing machine is as valid today as it ever was.

        Other notables were Charles Babage and Ada Lovelace.

        As for Thommy Flowers, he was treated shamefully. He put his own money and time into producing the non conceptual parts (mechanically / electrically functioning) of the Bombe. All he got at the end of it was the amount he had spent and this only after others lobbied for him to be recognised.

    3. No, I will not fix your computer

      Re: You're thinking of Lorenz

      >>This is a common mistake

      It's a common mistake, to think it's a common mistake, what is a "computer"; memory, stored programs etc. was defined by Turning way before we had the technology to do it.

      AI has barely moved on from those early papers of Turning, he predicted CISC and RISC before we had words for them, and their applicability for a learning computer, and the type of short-cuts that modern AI takes now to give an appearance of intelligence Turning rejected, the ramifications of which can not be overstated (we quite literally could have been working in the wrong direction with AI).

      Jack Copeland does a wonderful, insightful book, which very personal insights from people who knew Turning, clarifications around his death, and the importance of the work from people like Tommy Flowers, how it was all connected.

      http://www.amazon.co.uk/Turing-Information-B-Jack-Copeland/dp/0198719183

      1. SirWired 1

        Re: You're thinking of Lorenz

        >> It's a common mistake, to think it's a common mistake, what is a "computer"; memory, stored programs etc. was defined by Turning way before we had the technology to do it.

        All true, but this does not detract from the OP's point that the Bombe incorporates none of those principles, It was a straightforward electromechanical device that does not in any way resemble a general-purpose computer.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Unhappy

    And should Cameron win...

    ...the police will be round with a sledgehammer to smash it up.

    1. PNGuinn
      Black Helicopters

      Re: And should Cameron win...

      And if the other lot win??

      1. theModge

        Re: And should Cameron win...

        The policeman with the sledge hammer will be better paid, briefly, until he's deemed to expensive and sacked?

        (For clarity I'm firmly of view that the only man to enter parliament with honest intentions was guy fawkes and have no idea which particular bunch of bastards I'm going to vote for this time round, but I'm sure I'll feel soiled for having voted for them)

        1. Elmer Phud

          Re: And should Cameron win...

          "For clarity I'm firmly of view that the only man to enter parliament with honest intentions was guy fawkes"

          Yet he was set up, a pawn in the game of Prods V's Papists.

          1. lucki bstard

            Re: And should Cameron win...

            ' Yet he was set up, a pawn in the game of Prods V's Papists.' - Setup yes; but as a pawn for religious reasons or to create an excuse to provide a popular scapegoat?

            I'm more inclined to the 'create an excuse to provide a popular scapegoat' viewpoint especially as he was meant to be a visible high profile failure. (How that is reflected with the rise of 'Terrorism' and cyber terrorism as a government excuse for draconian powers, and the popular face of cyber terrorism wearing a Guy Fawkes mask I hate to think; but it is funny).

            But then I'm more inclined to the viewpoint that religion is very rarely a motivator, however sex, money and power tend to be the most common motivations (although normally you'll need to dig past the propaganda to find that).

        2. AndrueC Silver badge
          Meh

          Re: And should Cameron win...

          have no idea which particular bunch of bastards I'm going to vote for this time round, but I'm sure I'll feel soiled for having voted for them

          Living where I do (South Northants) it doesn't make much difference anyway. Even if everyone who couldn't be arsed to vote chose to vote 'not blue' they'd probably still get the seat unless they all voted red.

          1. Bleu

            Since this part of the thread is completely

            off-topic, I will add an on-topic reminder that Poles did much of the work on working out how Enigma (an ingenious design itself) worked. They did not just hand over a captured machine that they didn't comprehend to their intellectual betters at Bletchly Park, they understood how it worked, and explained that.

            Earlier this evening, I was sorry for a rat (animal) for the first time in my life. A back-street going home from work at times, central Tokyo, often saw the rat. Not the nasty type.

            The rat appeared briefly this evening, it looked pitiable, I really do not like rats, but I was moved by how it had been injured. Its movements were painful and it clearly had sense of mortality.

            Then I saw the reason, a big cat, not quite domestic.

            I hate the cat cult on the 'net, and the cat concerned would never qualify, but that is where cats do good, although I had seen that particular (lab I think) rat so many times, I was sorry to see it limping along last night, it was so pathetic in the original sense of the word, clearly injured.

            1. werdsmith Silver badge

              Re: Since this part of the thread is completely

              Yes, Marian Rejewski, Henryk Zygalski and Jerzy Różycki are very much part of the story and had the insight to use mathematics and create a basic version of the Bombe.

              What Bletchley Park did was create a huge industrial process, along with the outstations an Y-stations, communications network and with 8000 personnel and an information handling system to catch as much Nazi communications as possible. Then they broke enigma, lost enigma, rebroke enigma, lost it and rebroke it again. For Naval, air and army enigma, for steckerboard enigma, swappable reel enigma, 4 reel enigma etc. Some of the code breaking relied on code book capture. Much clever methodology was developed.

              British Tab at Letchworth built around 200 bombe machines which were employed on the mass operation along with the faster US Bombe that came later following Turing's trip to D.C.

              And Bill Tutte (not Turing) made the breakthrough at Bletchley on the Lorenz cipher which led to Tommy Flower's development of the Colossus computer (nothing to do with Enigma or Bombes).

              10 or so Colussi were built at Dollis Hill in London, each a development of the previous.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: And should Cameron win...

      In all seriousness, the only thing that could possibly be worse for the country than Cameron winning is if any of the other candidates win.

      1. Rich 11

        Re: And should Cameron win...

        At this stage I'm already wishing we'll end up like Belgium. Going without a goverment for the best part of a year didn't seem to do them much harm. The beer still kept flowing...

  5. Amorous Cowherder
    Pint

    Just a mere 27k for a letter by the first ever developer/programmer, Ada Lovelace? Sounds about right, even after 150 years women in IT still getting a bum deal!

    1. Bloakey1

      "Just a mere 27k for a letter by the first ever developer/programmer, Ada Lovelace? Sounds about right, even after 150 years women in IT still getting a bum deal!"

      Alan Turing wasn't averse to the odd bum deal himself.

    2. Bleu

      Why

      do you think Ada Countess Lovelace a software developer? She developed vague ideas for things to do on the Babbage machines, but none were realised.

      My fave old computers, and earliest to really deserve a place, are Zuse. Someone must make a simulator.

      Seriously, I would love to be contradicted, what did Countless Lovelace come up with in programming or language design that flowed into or influenced the current era?

      Nothing. Like Babbage.

    3. Bleu

      Why

      do you think Ada Countess Lovelace a software developer? She developed vague ideas for things to do on the Babbage machines, but none were realised.

      My fave old computers, and earliest to really deserve a place, are Zuse. Someone must make a simulator.

      Seriously, I would love to be contradicted, what did Countess Lovelace come up with in programming or language design that flowed into or influenced the current era?

      Did Babbage influence computers of now?

      I really think that he did not.

      1. Graham Dawson Silver badge

        Re: Why

        She's called the first programmer because she did in fact write an actual algorithm based on the specifications of the analytical engine. It was never tested on hardware, but its existence can't be denied.

  6. Roundtuit

    What is so bizarre about using the post to reach Paxman? Does he lack a letterbox? Is he 'unlisted'?

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