A Sweet Message
Delivered secretly to an inmate
When cybercriminal Josey escaped from the prison, the officials suspected he had help from outside. They didn’t know how he communicated with the outside, so they called me, a cyber detective, for help.
I met with the prison warden and asked, “Did Josey have any visitors?”
“Josey loved donuts, so his brother brought him a freshly baked donut every day. But we didn’t let the brother meet Josey. We always took the donut from the brother and carried it ourselves to Josey.”
“Did you check the box or the donut itself for any secret message?”
“Yes, we did and there was none. In fact, our staff watched Josey while he ate the donut. We knew for sure there was no message either inside or outside of the donut.”
“Were there any sprinkles or fancy patterns on the donut?”
“No, they were all plain donuts. Here are some pictures of those donuts.”
I took one look at the pictures and realized what had happened.
I said, “Josey was communicating with his bother using binary messages — ones and zeros.”
“But how?”
“See these two pictures? The donut with a hole is a zero and the donut without a hole is a one.”
For the weekly prompt:
