The Affine Cipher is another example of a

Monoalphabetic Substituiton cipher. It is

slightly different to the other examples
encountered here, since the encryption process
is substantially mathematical. The whole
process relies on working modulo m (the length
of the alphabet used). By performing a
calculation on the plaintext letters, we encipher
the plaintext. Encryption
The first step in the encryption process is to transform each of the letters in the plaintext alphabet
to the corresponding integer in the range 0 to m-1. With this done, the encryption process for
each letter is given by

E(x) = (ax + b) mod m

where a and b are the key for the cipher. This means that we multiply our integer value for the
plaintext letter by a, and then add b to the result. Finally, we take this modulus m (that is we take
the remainder when the solution is divided by m, or we take away the length of the alphabet until
we get a number less than this length).
As an example, let us encrypt the plaintext "affine cipher", using the key a = 5, b = 8. Firstly we
must find the integer value of each of the letters in the plaintext alphabet (the standard alphabet
of 26 letters in this case). The table below gives these values.

The standard values for the alphabet of 26 letters. Notice we

start at 0, not 1.
With the integer values of the plaintext letters found, the next step is to perform the calculations
on those values. In this instance, the calculation needed is (5x+8). Finally, we must ensure that
all our answers are calculated mod 26 and convert the integers back to ciphertext lettes. All this
informaion is shown in the table below.
 The affine cipher with a = 5, b = 8. We work out values of
letters, then do the calculations, before converting numbers
back to letters.
Thus the ciphertext produced is "IHHWVC SWFRCP".
Decryption
In deciphering the ciphertext, we must perform the opposite (or inverse) functions on the
ciphertext to retrieve the plaintext. Once again, the first step is to convert each of the ciphertext
letters into their integer values. We must now perform the following calculation on each integer
D(x) = c(x - b) mod m
where c is the modular multiplicative inverse of a. That is, a x c = 1 mod m (c is the number such
that when you multiply a by it, and keep taking away the length of the alphabet, you get to 1).
Continuing our example, we shall decrypt the ciphertext "IHHWVC SWFRCP", using a key
of a = 5, b = 8. The first step here is to find the inverse of a, which in this case is 21 (since 21 x 5
= 105 = 1 mod 26, as 26 x 4 = 104, and 105 - 104 = 1). We must now perform the inverse
calculations on the integer values of the ciphertext. In this case the calculation in 21(y - 8). Once
again, we must take these answers modulo 26, and finally convert the integers back to plaintext
letters. This is shown in the table below.

The decryption process for a key of a = 5, b = 8. We had to

find the inverse of a first, which is 21.
We retrieve our plaintext of "affine cipher".
iscussion
Possibly a simpler way for encrypting and decrypting, especially for large messages, is to create
the ciphertext alphabet using the encryption process on each letter of the plaintext alphabet. This
can then be used to encrypt (or decrypt) each individual letter of the plaintext. The table below
shows this for the example considered above.
The ciphertext alphabet for the Affine Cipher with key a = 5,
b = 8.
One of the peculiarities of the Affine Cipher is the fact that not all keys will work. Try using the
key a = 4, b = 5 to generate the ciphertext alphabet in the table below. You can check the
answers you get.
hat is the problem with using the key a = 4 and b = 5?
This key creates the situation where more than one plaintext letter is encrypted to the same
ciphertext letter (for example, above both "e" and "r" encipher to "V"). This means that when it
comes to decrypting, the recipient will be unable to know which one of the plaintext letters has
been used. Clearly this is a huge problem in using the Affine Cipher, and it is essential for the
key to be chosen carefully.
Can you find other keys that have the same problem?
is problem occurs since the multiplicative inverse of a does not exist modulo m. That is, there is
more than one number that can be multiplied by 4 to get 1 modulo 26.
There is a quick way to check if an inverse exists for a given m and a (relying on an advanced
mathematics topic called group theory). The inverse of a modulo m exists if and only
if a and mare coprime (that is they have no common factor other than 1). Hence, a = 4 does not
work when m = 26, as they have a common factor of 2 (2 goes in to both 4 and 26), but a = 5
does work, since 5 and 26 are coprime.
We can also calculate all the possible keys for the Affine Cipher. Since, for the standard
alphabet, there are 12 numbers less than 26 which are coprime to 26, and for each of these there
are 26 possibilities for the value of b, we have a total of 12 x 26 = 312 possible keys for the
Affine Cipher. Due to this relatively low number of possible keys (we shall compare this with
more secure ciphers later), the Affine Cipher is once again susceptible to a Brute Force Attack,
especially in the age of computers, and is hence not a particularly secure cipher.
Given this, we can also make the cipher a bit more secure by choosing an alphabet with a prime
number of elements (since then all the numbers less than our prime are coprime to it, by
definition). Thus, with our alphabet of 31 elements (the 26 letters, space and 4 punctuation
marks), we have 30 possible values for a, and still 26 values for b each time, and hence there are
30 x 26 = 780 possible keys for this alphabet. Although this is significantly more secure keys
than the standard alphabet, with computing power we can still perform a brute force attack
(trying every possible key) within a few minutes.
One other way to adapt the Affine Cipher quite simply is to change the numbering of the letters.
The simplest way to do this (and perhaps a more expected way) is to label "a" as 1, "b" as 2 and
so on, as in the table below.

The other way to assign values to the letters in the alphabet.

Although this is more intuitive, the maths in the other version
is easier and has a lot of advantages.
Using this will clearly give different results compared to the normal way of assigning values to
letters, but the process is identical.