The scrambled text was a code—a “ciphertext”—groups of numbers and letters representing encrypted words.
Eventually one of them explained what Becker had already surmised. The scrambled text was a code—a “ciphertext”—groups of numbers and letters representing encrypted words. The cryptographers’ job was to study the code and extract from it the original message, or “cleartext.” The NSA had called Becker because they suspected the original message was written in Mandarin Chinese; he was to translate the symbols as the cryptographers decrypted them.
