The FBI it decipher a cryptogram that may hold clues to a decade-old murder.
In June 1999, the body of 41-year-old Ricky McCormick was found in a field near St Louis, Missouri. Police found few clues, except for two encrypted notes in his trouser pockets, thought to have been written by McCormick himself. Ever since, these messages have withstood attempts to decipher them using the FBI鈥檚 standard techniques, which include statistical analysis to learn which characters appear most frequently. Now the bureau is asking for help.
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鈥淲e have our theories, but we鈥檇 like to hear other people鈥檚 theories,鈥� says Dan Olson, chief of the bureau鈥檚 cryptanalysis and racketeering records unit.
鈥淲e鈥檝e got the Kryptos group working on it,鈥� says , co-leader of an dedicated to cracking the code engraved in the CIA鈥檚 . Jim Gillogly, a Calfornia-based computer scientist and the first person to publicly solve the first three parts of Kryptos, has also tried his hand at the McCormick code, but admits, 鈥淚 haven鈥檛 had any thoughts that the FBI wouldn鈥檛 have come up with.鈥�
Fresh look
Olson wouldn鈥檛 say which approaches the bureau cryptanalysts have tried already, saying he wants a fresh perspective from the public.
鈥淎nyone at all could spot something on these papers,鈥� says Chet Richards, president of the , a group for codebreaking hobbyists. 鈥淚t may require more imagination than cryptanalytic training.鈥�
The FBI has set up to collect solution submissions and tips about the case.
