yo-yo-yo-jbo / cicada_tools

Cicada 3301 Python utilities

Cicada 3301 tools

Cicada 3301 Python utilities for decryption purposes.

Assumptions

There is a lot of documented material on Cicada 3301 and the currently unsolved version 2 of their rune-based encrypted "book", AKA Liber Primus or LP2 for short.

Based on the encrypted payload, I hafe a few assumptions:

1. The cipher encrypts entire words in some fashion (based on the word lengths and punctuation).
2. The cipher works on at least two letters at the same time (Digraphs) due to IoC tests.
3. The cipher probably treats two consecutive letters differently (e.g. like Playfair cipher does). This is a conclusion from the low distribution of doublets in the entire LP2.

Attempts made

1. Using Hill cipher with one of the magic squares used as the matrix key, optionally with Atbash, Shifts and prime substruction.
2. Using sophisticated shifts on a decrypted Vigenere cipher with the word INSTAR as the key.

Coding and classes

The following section includes coding and useful classes:

LiberPrimus.py

Contains utilities for LP and LP2 translations:

1. Each translation class inherits from Translation base class and should implement one method decrypt(self, page). Parameters to translation classes should be assigned at their construction.
2. A class called UnsolvedTranslation marks pages that are not translated.
3. The LiberPrimusPages class contains a PAGES member which is a list of 2-tuples: (cipher, translation).
4. The LiberPrimusPages class also exports convinience methods such as get_unsolved_pages().

CicadataUtils.py

Contains a class called Cicada which does a lot of basic encryption, decryption and heuristics.

1. It contains the members RUNES and LATIN that translate runes to latin as per the Cicada Gematria Primus.
2. Helper methods such as find_next_prime, totient, heuristically_english and press_enter.
3. Working translations such as runes_to_latin, hill_decrypt_to_runes, autokey_decrypt_to_runes and vigenere_decrypt.
4. Outside of the Cicada class there is a method called tests which shows all the translated pages, and a method called solve which will hopefully one day solve LP2. As of now, solve is the main way to experiment.

Example of solution attempt

Assuming we wish to use "INSTAR" as a vigenere cipher, we could code the following:

def solve():
    """
        Wishful thinking.
    """

    # Get all unsolved pages
    pages = LiberPrimus.LiberPrimusPages.get_unsolved_pages()

    # Good luck!
    idx = 0
    for page in pages:
        idx += 1
        print(f'PAGE {idx}\n\n')
        print(Cicada.vigenere_decrypt(page, 'ᛁᚾᛋᛏᚪᚱ'))
        Cicada.press_enter()