#nsa_backdoor

  • Barbie typewriter
    http://www.cryptomuseum.com/crypto/mehano/barbie

    The Barbie Typewriter E-118, is a low-cost electronic typewriter, developed as a childeren’s toy by Mehano in Slovenia (formerly: Yugoslavia) and sold worldwide by Mattel (US) 1 . The E-118 is the latest model in the product line that started with the E-115. The electronic typewriter was the successor to the earlier purely mechanical Barbie typewriter models. It is little known that all electronic variants have a hidden built-in cryptographic capability that allows secret writing.

    • When the E-115 was adopted by Mattel as an addition to the Barbie™ product line, it was aimed mainly at girls with a minimum age of 5 years. For this reason the product was given a pink-and-purple case and the Barbie logo and image were printed on the body. As it was probably thought that secret writing would not appeal to girls, the coding/decoding facilities were omitted from the manual. Nevertheless, these facilities can still be accessed if you know how to activate them.
      […]
      Although there are many different models and country variants of the Barbie typewriters, and the internal PCB was redesigned a number of times, the encryption/decryption facilities seem to be present on all electronic models. The crypto facilities can be accessed by pressing SHIFT and LOCK in combination with one of the highlighted keys in the diagram below.

      Pas vraiment besoin de #NSA_backdoor, le chiffrement se fait par substitution monoalphabétique, normalement à la portée du cryptographe débutant ;-)