Auguste Kerckhoffs
More info
- Born
- Died
- Known for
- Kerckhoffs's principle
- Nationality
- Dutch
The Dutch linguist who in 1883 wrote down six rules for military cryptography — one of which still governs the entire field.
Born in Nuth in the Netherlands, he worked as a language teacher in Paris. He devoted much of his life to constructed languages and became one of the leading advocates of Volapük, but it is his two articles in Journal des sciences militaires in 1883 that outlived him.
In them he sets out six requirements for a military cryptosystem. Five are practical and of their time: the system should be portable, operable by one person, and not demand long lists to memorise. The second became immortal — security must reside in the key alone, not in keeping the method secret. Shannon restated it half a century later, and it remains the reason ciphers are standardised through open review.