ABSTRACT
Encryption Mathematics for Everyone! While I was writing this book—the early years—a war for our privacy was being waged between fortunately brilliant “nobodies”—computer jockeys, mathematicians, academics—and some of the most powerful people in the world—presidents, generals,.... There is a branch of mathematics/computer science called encryption. In particular, a fellow, Whitfield Diffie, discovered public key encryption which allows two people to communicate in private via computer e-mail, for example. It is analogous to putting your message in a sealed envelope as opposed to a postcard that anyone along the way can read. One of the heroes of this battle is Phil Zimmerman, who lived in Boulder, Colorado at the time. What Zimmerman did was create encryption software called PGP, or Pretty Good Privacy. Using this software anyone can “put their e-mail in an envelope” and send it to someone else who can then easily “open the envelope with the appropriate key.”
