Information AboutDavid Kahn |
| CATEGORIES ABOUT DAVID KAHN | |
| 1930 births | |
| american science writers | |
| american historians | |
| american writers | |
| american journalists | |
| espionage historians | |
| alumni of the university of oxford | |
| living people | |
Kahn's first book was ''The Codebreakers'' ( 1967 ), widely considered a definitive account of the History Of Cryptography up to the early 1960s. THE CODEBREAKERS ''The Codebreakers'' comprehensively chronicles the , in ''Newsday'' 2004-09-19 Kahn, then a journalist, was contracted to write a book on cryptology in 1961. He began writing it part-time, at one point quitting his job to work on it full timeBamford, 1982, p. 126. The book was to include information on the NSA, and according to author James Bamford writing in 1982, the agency attempted to stop its publication, and considered various options, including writing a negative review of Kahn's work to be published in the press to discredit himBamford, 1982, p. 127. A committee of the United States Intelligence Board concluded that the book was "a possibly valuable support to foreign COMSEC authorities" and recommended "further low-key actions as possible, but short of legal action, to discourage Mr. Kahn or his prospective publishers". Kahn's publisher, Macmillan, handed over the manuscript to the government for review without Kahn's permission on 4 March 1966. Kahn and Macmillan eventually agreed to remove some material from the manuscript, particularly concerning the relationship between the NSA and its counterpart in the United Kingdom, GCHQ Bamford, 1982, pp. 128-130. Because of the year of its publication, the book did not cover most of the history concerning the breaking of the German Enigma Machine (which became public knowledge only in the 1970s); nor did it cover the advent of strong cryptography in the public domain, beginning with the invention of Public Key Cryptography and the specification of the Data Encryption Standard in the mid-1970s. The book was republished in 1996 , and this new edition includes an additional chapter briefly covering the events since the original publication. ''The Codebreakers'' was a finalist for the non-fiction Pulitzer Prize in 1968 . BIOGRAPHY Kahn was born in New York City to Jesse Kahn, a lawyer, and Florence (nee Abraham), a glass manufacturer. Kahn traces his interest in cryptography to reading Fletcher Pratt 's ''Secret and Urgent'' as a boy. Kahn is a founding editor of the '' Cryptologia '' journal. On October 22, 1969 he married Susanne Fiedler, with whom he has had two sons, Oliver and Michael. He attended New York Times Magazine '' about two defectors from the National Security Agency. This article was the origin of his monumental book, '' The Codebreakers ''. Subsequently, Kahn was an editor at the '' International Herald Tribune '' in Paris for two years in the 1960s. Kahn was awarded a doctorate (DPhil) from Oxford University in 1974 in modern German history under the supervision of the then Regius professor of modern history, Hugh Trevor-Roper . He worked as a reporter and an Op-ed editor for Newsday until 1998 , and journalism for a few years at New York University . In 1995 , Kahn was selected as the scholar in residence at the National Security Agency . Kahn lives (as of 2005) in Great Neck, Long Island, a suburb of New York. He has lived in Washington, D.C. ; Paris, France ; Freiburg Im Breisgau, Germany ; and Oxford, England . Kahn has donated a collection of books, papers and artifacts on codes and ciphers to the National Cryptologic Museum . National Cryptologic Museum – Acquisitions PUBLICATIONS
QUOTES
REFERENCES EXTERNAL LINKS
|
|
|