This book combines lessons on how to program in Python with making and breaking ciphers.  After a crash course in Python programming basics, author Al Sweigart shows how to make, test, and hack programs that encrypt text with classical ciphers like the transposition cipher and Vigenère cipher. The examples begin with simple programs for the reverse and Caesar ciphers and works up to public key cryptography. 

Each program includes the full code and a line-by-line explanation of how things work.

Author: Al Sweigart
Publisher: No Starch Press
Date: Jan 2018
Pages: 416
ISBN: 978-1593278229
Print: 1593278225
Kindle: B0713P1Q8X
Audience: would-be Python programmers
Level: Introductory
Category: Python

• Combine loops, variables, and flow control statements into real working programs
• Use dictionary files to instantly detect whether decrypted messages are valid English or gibberish
• Create test programs to make sure that your code encrypts and decrypts correctly
• Code (and hack!) a working example of the affine cipher, which uses modular arithmetic to encrypt a message
• Break ciphers with techniques such as brute-force and frequency analysis

For recommendations of Python books see Books for Pythonistas and Python Books For Beginners in our Programmer's Bookshelf section.

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