HistoCrypt 2024 was held in Oxford and then on the final day a tour of Bletchley. I had been fortunate enough to book my tickets earlier in the year, and it came as no surprise that this years HistoCrypt was breaking records on attendance, submissions and posters. Also the weather was exceptionally good, allowing for a full day of both conference and exploring Oxford and the surrounding area.
For me and related to my research, understanding more about historical cryptanalysis plays an import part in knowing how we reached the various methods in use today. The opportunity to see Collusus and a Bombe operating in Bletchley was a very big incentive to go as well, and to have these amazing pieces of technology explained by dedicated experts.
Days 1 & 2 – Presentations, Demos and Poster Sessions
After registration and excellent introduction by the event organizers it was straight into the presentations. Daniel Shiu gave an excellent presentation on the legacy of Bletchly Park on UK Mathematics, I was lucky enough to have some time with Daniel, he is incredibly knowledgeable in so many areas and thoroughly approachable. His publication on the subject is available here and its a fascinating read. It is amazing how the people who worked at Bletchley continued to work and network together, providing further advancement in their respective fields that continue to both academic knowledge and practical application of their work.
Nils Kopal gave an excellent presentation on the M-209 cipher and use of CryptTool. This talk was of very real interest to me as Machine Learning was used. Whilst there was plenty to be seen at the poster sessions, it was a real pleasure to meet Oriol Closa who took me thru his poster. It had some great visuals on there I would of made more prominent, but it was great to have it explained to me.
In the evenings my wife and I thoroughly enjoyed the countryside around Oxford, its really beautiful, asides the gigantic diversion because of work outside the railway station !
Bletchley and National Museum of Computing Tour
I headed over to Bletchley in my own car as to get to and from easier. The tour of the National Museum of Computing didn’t disappoint. It was fantastic to not only see Collusus in operation, but also a Bombe, all with expert explanation. After the tour of the NMoC it was a VIP Tour of Bletchley itself, needless to say, it was brilliant, with far more insight and knowledge gained.
Seeing Colossus in operation and with such a fantastic explanation was really amazing, understanding how it operated and how the data was programmed into it was fascinating. The wiring and clicking of relays is a sight to behold.
Space was tight around the Enigma Bombe demo, but it was a great opportunity to see the reverse side and see the mighty Bombe in operation. It really amazes me that this technology was created in the 1930’s. I can only imagine what a room full of these running sounded like !
I headed back to the National Museum of Computing and got some excellent pictures of the historic computers, i particularly liked the info about the speed of the disk !
I found Histocrypt to be brilliant and felt very lucky to have been able to attend, with a great line up in speakers and presentations, followed by the tour of Bletchley it was a very memorable trip and I hope to attend future Histocrypts – the next one is in Poland, which is a bit further afield than Oxford !
Many thanks to the organizers and sponsors of Histocrypt, it must of been an amazing amount of hard work to organize this event and one I shall remember for many years to come.