Simon Singh

In his first book since the bestselling Fermat’s Enigma, Simon Singh offers the first sweeping history of encryption, tracing its evolution and revealing the dramatic effects codes have had on wars, nations, and individual lives. From Mary, Queen of Scots, trapped by her own code, to the Navajo Code Talkers who helped the Allies win World War II, to the incredible (and incredibly simple) logisitical breakthrough that made Internet commerce secure, The Code Book tells the story of the most powerful intellectual weapon ever known: secrecy. Throughout the text are clear technical and mathematical explanations, and portraits of the remarkable personalities who wrote and broke the world’s most difficult codes. Accessible, compelling, and remarkably far-reaching, this book will forever alter your view of history and what drives it. It will also make you wonder how private that e-mail you just sent really is.

A half century ago, a shocking Washington Post headline claimed that the world began in five cataclysmic minutes rather than having existed for all time; a skeptical scientist dubbed the maverick theory the Big Bang. In this amazingly comprehensible history of the universe, Simon Singh decodes the mystery behind the Big Bang theory, lading us through the development of one of the most extraordinary, important, and awe-inspiring theories in science.

Combining impeccable history and intriguing stories of espionage and intellectual breakthroughs, this riveting bestseller, by the author of the popular science classic Fermat's Last Theorem, brings to life the secret world of cryptographers and code-breakers from Ancient Egypt to the age of the internet.

Endru Vajls je sanjao da može dokazati Fermaovu poslednju teoremu od trenutka kada je o tome nešto pročitao u obližnjoj biblioteci, kao desetogodišnji dečak. I dok su nade mnogih drugih bile uništene, njegov san je bio predodređen da se ostvari - ali samo posle mnogo godina frustracija, uzbudljivih proboja i slamajućih razočaranja.