One-time pad
Libreta de un solo uso
- Date
- 1882 · confidence high
- Place
- Sacramento, California, United States
- Credited to
- Frank Miller; electrical system by Gilbert Vernam and randomness principle by Joseph Mauborgne
- Field
- Knowledge & symbols
⚠️ Disputed: the sources disagree.
What it is
Banker Frank Miller described in 1882 the first one-time-key system for telegraphy; between 1917 and 1919, unaware of his work, Gilbert Vernam built at AT&T an electrical version based on teleprinters, and Joseph Mauborgne added the decisive idea that the key be fully random, which makes the cipher mathematically unbreakable.
Miller's 1882 work was only rediscovered in archives in the early 21st century; for decades credit went entirely to Vernam and Mauborgne, who reached the idea without knowing of Miller's work.
What it led to
- Vernam's cipher teleprinter, patented in 1919
- Use of one-time-pad encryption in top-secret diplomatic and intelligence communications