Rail Fence Cryptography in Securing Information

Andysah Putera Utama Siahaan

Faculty of Computer Science
Universitas Pembanguan Panca Budi
Jl. Jend. Gatot Subroto Km. 4,5 Sei Sikambing, 20122, Medan, Sumatera Utara, Indonesia
andiesiahaan@gmail.com
Abstract Rail Fence Cipher is a further development
method of Caesar Cipher. In Caesar algorithm, the results
derived from the ciphertext letters shifting each character
in the plaintext. While in the Rail Fence, it is taken from the
ciphertext block formation matrix diagonally. The level of
security in this method has advantages than in the previous
method. In this study, we will try how to encrypt and
decrypt the message using the Rail Fence algorithm. The
ciphertext is obtained by taking a certain set of characters
in the line that has been determined earlier.

character is replaced by the cell index which was taken from

column and row index. The cell name is used to change the
plaintext to be ciphertext. If we want to use more than 26 letters
or add the number to the encryption, we have to extend the grid.
The 6 x 6 can cover 36 characters, 7 x 7 has 49 characters and
so on. However, at Polybius time, it was only used to hide the
standard message. It is usually done in war. They hoped the
message did not fall into enemy lines.

Keywords Rail Fence, Cryptography, Security, Zig Zag

I.

INTRODUCTION

Cryptography is the art of science [1] [2]. It has two main

subfields (i.e. cryptography and cryptanalysis). Cryptography
is the science of creating secret codes; Cryptanalysis is the
science of breaking codes. These two aspects are closely
related; when creating a secret code the analysis of its security
plays an important role [3]. It has been an interesting part to
understand. It is primarily used by military and government
peripherals. Private and commercial organizations have rarely
considered it necessary to support the security of all link to the
obvious place. There is a various method of applying the
cryptographic systems. The crypto companies are interested in
financial circumstances. Rail Fence is one of the classic
cryptosystem worked by substituting the position of the
characters. It also called Transposition Cipher. Transposition
ciphers rearrange the letters of plaintext without replacing them
with another character.
II. THEORIES
A. Polybius Square
The Polybius Square is an ancient cryptography invention. It
is discovered by a scholar named Polybius in the second
century BC. Polybius find a password system that eventually
were used for several centuries. Polybius put the letters in the
column line array size of 5 5. The way this system works is
that every letter is expressed as rows and columns in which the
letters are placed. For example, the letter "A" is encoded with
"1-1", "B" as "1-2", C as 1-3, D as 1-4, E as 1-5
and so on. Because of the complete standard letters are 26,
whereas only 25 places available, so in this system, the letter
"I" and "J" have the same code. Figure 1 shows the form of the
square matrix. It has five columns and five rows. Every

Figure 1. The Polybius Square

Polybius does not have the specific key. It only uses the
transposition to turn into ciphertext. It is a very standard
encryption and weak. We need to add more security system to
its algorithm. The password is a good idea to make it secure.
Alternatively, maybe we can reorder the character position in
the grid.
B. Rail Fence
Rail Fence inspired from Polybius square modeling.
However, in Rail Fence, the ciphertext does not follow the
Polybius regulation. He formed his trajectory. This trajectory
shaped Zig Zag. That is why this method is often called Zig Zag
Cryptography. The Rail Fence is a simple example of the
transposition ciphers and very weak algorithm [4]. Generally,
in this method, the plaintext elements are written into a matrix
form approved by the sender and the receiver. It means the
matrix model is approved or know by both participants. There
are many ways how to form the ciphertext. Sometimes it can be
performed by diagonal retrieval.

Rail Fence Cipher security is very weak. The weakness can

be seen from the lack of key. The number of practical keys is
small enough that a cryptanalyst can break. It allows mixing up
of characters in plaintext to produce the ciphertext, it offers
essentially no communication security and will be shown that
it can be easily broken. It cannot be used to encrypt images
containing large areas of single color. Although the Rail Fence
is weak, it can be mixed with another cryptography algorithm
such as substitution cipher, the combination of which is harder
to break than either cipher on its own [5].

The word is arranged in diagonal order as seen in Figure 3.

The first character places on the first row and the first column.
The next characters are put by adding row and column
simultaneously. The arrangement goes up continuously. After it
reaches the top rows, it turns back down to reach the first row
again. It continues until reach the last character. If it does not
get the top character but the rest of character is empty, the rest
of cell is placed by letter X or something else decided earlier.

Figure 2. The Rail Fence Structure

Figure 2 illustrates how to form the text into Zig Zag
cryptography. The grid above consists of three rows. The
sentence DEFEND THE EAST WALL is split into the array
of a character. The rest is filled with X. The Rail Fence has a
unique trajectory, diagonal step. The length of the column
depends on the total amount of characters divides how many
rows to be expected. The ASCII can be implemented by using
this method since it does not have the new character table.
III. IMPLEMENTATION
In the implementation, we try to figure out how the Rail
Fence algorithm works. The calculation of this algorithm is
very simple and easy. We just arrange the position of the
characters instead of having a calculation of a heavy
mathematical operation. To find how it works, lets see the
explanation below. Assume we have the message
ANDYSAH as the plaintext. First, the grid must be
determined. We decide to have three rows in its
implementation.

Figure 4. The row and column information.

Figure 4 illustrates the information of every character. We
have seven data of the message. The first data is letter A
which placed in row 1 and column 1. Next, the second is letter
N in row 2 and column 2. The top row is 3. If the data reaches
this row, it will be subtracted until it reaches the first row. The
message above contains two data which rows are in the top
rows such as data 3 and data 7.

Figure 5. The data is sorted in descending order.

Figure 3. The grid.

Figure 5 explains the data than has previously been arranged

in row order. The ciphertext is obtained by sorting the data in
descending order. At this step, the row is the header of the sort.
We see that the data number 3 and 7 will be the first order since
they have the highest row. In the other word, they are
categorized based on rows.

and A. Then the last retrieval is from the first row, such as
letter A and S. The letters will be concatenated soon after
completed.

Figure 6. The data taken from the third row.

Figure 8. The ciphertext.

Figure 8 shows the result of the Rail Fence process. The
ciphertext obtained is DHNYAAS. The decryption step is to
reconstruct the grid using the previous message. We start
putting characters from the highest row. If we know the top row,
the ciphertext is breakable. The top row or how much is the
row is the decryption key. Anyone can break the message by
trying such a set of keys, start from 1 and so on. Lets see the
illustration in following tables below. Assume we try to decrypt
the previous ciphertext DHNYAAS.
Table 1. The decryption process (part 1).
Figure 7. The data taken from the second row.

7
H

B
A

Table 1 shows the first two characters is put in cell C3 and

C7. Since the length of the ciphertext is 7, we have to make the
length of the column is 7 as well. The first character is put in
C3 because we know that the top row is 3. The second character
in cell C7. Why? Lets see the formation. The first in column 3.
The next character must be in C3 B4 A5 B6 C7
formation. We still have column number 7.
Table 2. The decryption process (part 2).
Figure 8. The data taken from the first row.
Figure 6 to Figure 8 are the process of the ciphertext
retrieval. In Figure 6, we draw the characters in the top row.
They are letter D and H. In Figure 7, we draw the data from
the second row again. The characters will be letter N, Y,

C
B
A

Table 2 shows the next characters is put in cell B2, B4, and
B6. The first character has been occupied in C3. The first
character in row B must be in B2. So, the formation will be B2
C3/A3 B4 and B4 C5/A5 B6. The letters N, Y and
A are put in cells B2, B4, and B6.
Table 3. The decryption process (part 3).
1

C
B
A

The rest of two characters, letter A and S are placed in

cell A1 and A5. The first character is put in cell A1 since cell
C3 and B2 have been occupied before. The formation will be
A1 B2 C3 B4 A5. The last character is put in Cell A5
based on the formation.
Table 4. The complete process of decryption.
1

B
A

N
A

7
H

A
S

Table 4 shows the complete process of the decryption.

Knowing the top row or the highest row used in the construction
set, we will easily obtain the plaintext back without asking
permission getting the key. After we construct all characters in
the table, we can concatenate each character in series of string.
The plaintext obtained is ANDYSAH. Until now, the process
of Rail Fence is just finished.
IV. CONCLUSION
In this paper, We have presented how to implement the Rail
Fence encryption and decryption. The Rail Fence algorithm is
a simple cryptography algorithm. However, it is not secure. The
key is how many rows is implemented. It can be guessed by
making a brute-force attack. The decryption process can be
solved quickly by hand. Moreover, it is quicker if solved by
using a computer. The way to increase the security level, we
have to combine this algorithm with another technique or
modify the table by changing the trajectory. Random position
of transposition might improve the security. We hope the
further research can develop this algorithm to be more
protected. There are many ways can contribute in this method.

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