<p>我想我大概理解你说的是什么东西，类似的场景在中国共产党和中国国民党争夺中国政权的时候出现过。</p>
<p>中国的谍战电视剧或电影里有描述关于中国共产党地下组织怎么传递信息的：</p>
<p>当时是中国国民党在中国占主导地位，此时的中国共产党势力要弱，有一些间谍差不多就是用你说的方法传递接头信息的，比如，中国共产党会在县城的某个地方开个书店或药铺等门店，这个门店就是间谍和中国共产党组织街头传递信息的重要场合，然后某个人(其实就是间谍)经常去这个书店借书看，然后把一张纸条放到要归还的书里，当然这个纸条上面写的有文字，真正有效的信息包含在这张纸条中，这张纸条可以看作已经经过加密的文本了，事先双方提前约定好解密的方式，也就是怎么提取纸条中包含有效的信息，纸条上面写有一大段话，语句是通顺的，而且也是正常叙事，一个局外人看了觉得没什么，但是中国共产党组织的人员在有加密后的文本，并且知道解密了方式，那么可能会得出重要情报，比如解密后得出情报：明日9时日军物资达到北平火车战。</p>
<p>还有就是事先双方提前约定好解密的方式，这种解密方式可能会经常变动，以确保安全，加密后的信息隐藏在一整本书里，根据已知的解密方式，翻到某一页，找到第几行，第几个字，然后再翻到某一页，找到第几行，第几个字，这样重复几次或十几次就获得重要的情报信息了。</p>
<p>类似的传递情报的方式太多了，还有一种叫做<code>接头暗号</code>的东西，<code>接头暗号</code>在谍战剧中频频出现，当组织新派一个人与间谍见面时会对<code>接头暗号</code>，如果<code>接头暗号</code>对不上，对方就是假冒的接头人，所以在谍战剧中常常看到中国国民党对中国共产党的地下组织工作者严刑拷打，逼问<code>接头暗号</code>。</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2024-10-27T09:37:40.377Z
2024-10-27T11:19:51.403Z
2024-10-27T11:19:51.403Z
Tom
<p>Do you mean something like this：</p>
<p>生入红尘种梦根，<br />
日来百祝共销魂。<br />
快推诗笔觅新句，<br />
乐满长笺始寄君。</p>
<p>Taking the first characters of each line, we have:</p>
<p>生日快乐</p>
<p>Of course, the possibilities are endless! If I put the date in my letter, take each character according to the date, perhaps?</p>
<p>I read just the other day, the Chinese, using a quantum computer, cracked military grade encryption! (Not really cracking, just quantum brute force.)</p>
<p>Still don't know why this question turns up on my phone, but not on my computer!</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2024-10-27T15:58:40.513Z
2024-10-27T15:58:40.513Z
Pedroski
<p>try “拆字”, or “離合”, the traditional methods to “cipher” characters</p>
<p><a href="https://chinese.stackexchange.com/questions/30227/what-words-exist-that-come-from-deconstructed-characters/30228#30228">What words exist that come from deconstructed characters?</a></p>
<blockquote>
<p>a radical-based null cipher be possible in Chinese?</p>
</blockquote>
<p><strong>no</strong>. btw, it should be “component (部件)-based”</p>
<blockquote>
<p>involves a network of secret agents who seek to communicate over the mail</p>
</blockquote>
<p>well, . . .  a rant, or query here: the mail delivery “system” in the past is, quite slow. it may take weeks, or months to send a mail. no organisation would survive with such communication speed.</p>
<p>have fun :)</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-10-01T14:03:54.257Z
Well, there was "飛鴿傳書".
Nobody
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-10-01T14:12:22.820Z
@Nobody, plus 魚雁 
水巷孑蠻
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-10-01T22:59:11.923Z
Also, getting stopped at a border of a territory to enter another , just to deliver your mail could get quite interesting over time haha.
zagrycha
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-10-03T06:11:33.800Z
I've always called components 偏旁, so I'm a bit surprised by 部件 here.  Are they both the same thing?
Becky 李蓓
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-10-03T06:47:34.057Z
@Becky李蓓, “Are they both the same thing?” **no** radical (部首) normally refers to 214 radicals used in 康熙字典. or, 540 radicals used in 說文解字. **radical should be used for indexing only**
水巷孑蠻
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-10-03T06:57:02.580Z
@Becky李蓓, in recent decades, people decompose a han character into component (部件), it’s not yet finalised, “根據中央研究院文獻處理實驗室的統計，所有的基本部件總數為1316個”, there’re thousands components used in han chinese. the total numbers varied, depends on who / where did it, including oracle bone script / bronze script, or not. that depends on who / where did it  here’s a wiki page, have a look: <https://zh.wikipedia.org/zh-hant/漢字部件#:~:text=正體字計441部件、簡化字計367部件%E3%80%82>
水巷孑蠻
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-10-01T13:16:39.763Z
2023-10-01T13:16:39.763Z
水巷孑蠻
<p>There are several issues that I can think of. Take your example of 偷. How would the recipient know that the character 仔 is the one to start with, and not any other ones? How would he tell that he ought to end with 瑜 and not some other character?</p>
<p>I think a grille cipher is more doable.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-10-03T06:36:02.927Z
Counting. The algorithm could be simply to combine the first component of characters 1, 6, 11... with the second component of characters 3, 8, 13... it also can be much more complicated; special signs could change the order, maybe one needs to read the page diagonally, etc
KeizerHarm
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-10-03T03:20:13.970Z
2023-10-03T03:20:13.970Z
fat penguin
<p>I'm writing a story set partially in historic China, and it involves a network of secret agents who seek to communicate over the mail in innocuous-looking letters. So I need a description of a pen-and-paper cipher that works for the Chinese language and (traditional) writing system. The story is not ultimately about the language or the cipher, it is just an element that I want to describe accurately.</p>
<p>For the plot I need to use a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Null_cipher" rel="nofollow noreferrer">null cipher</a>; a way to conceal the secret message in a large amount of regular text by interspersing the secret stuff with lots of random stuff that together looks like it is about something different entirely.</p>
<p>In alphabetical scripts that would work by taking every n'th word, or every n'th letter, and putting them behind each other. This example from Wikipedia:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>HE GOT A GOOD HEART. SHOULD YOU BE HAVING PROBLEMS BE ASSURED THAT WHEN YOU HIT THE STREETS...</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Taking every 5th word:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>HE SHOULD BE HIT</p>
</blockquote>
<p>I'm considering, for this story, to say that this particular cipher mixed and matched components. That is to say, if the agent wanted to encrypt &quot;steal&quot;, 偷; he would find another character starting with 人 (e.g. 仔) and another character ending with 俞 (e.g. 瑜), and write some text between to make it flow as a sentence. Then he'd just need to do so in a regular manner; let's say picking the first component of every 3rd character, then the second component of every 5th character, and maybe some extra cases for characters with even more components. Another agent who reads the text can read it selectively and get the secret message.</p>
<p>That is the level of explanation I'd use in the story; so the question is basically whether that, on the surface, looks feasible. I'm not going to write any actual ciphered text. I just don't want to do disrespect to any speaker of Chinese who comes across the story when I eventually put it online.</p>
<p>Rather than invent my own, I would have used an actual historic cipher, but they seem hard to find. The only one I could find attested is a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grille_%28cryptography%29" rel="nofollow noreferrer">grille cipher</a>. That too is a null cipher, but it operates on the level of whole characters; and I presume that hiding the entire word &quot;steal&quot; in a text would be more suspicious than just hiding its components. Plus using components I can use it in a scene where someone explains the Chinese script itself, for a nice little educational bonus.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-10-01T12:43:54.457Z
[藏頭詩](https://zh.wikipedia.org/zh-tw/%E8%97%8F%E9%A0%AD%E8%A9%A9) or [嵌字文](https://zh.wikipedia.org/zh-tw/%E5%B5%8C%E5%AD%97%E6%96%87) are common in Chinese.
Nobody
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-10-01T13:06:22.270Z
@Nobody Very helpful, thank you very much!
KeizerHarm
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-10-02T08:36:59.160Z
That's a rather obvious way to hide a message, though. Therefore it's not secure.
fat penguin
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-10-02T08:41:00.203Z
One thing you may want to note is sending mail was a rather difficult task in ancient China as there was no postal service for a very long time. Only the government had the facilities of sending mail. Civilians could only send mail via couriers in general.
fat penguin
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-10-02T08:56:22.853Z
@fatpenguin The setting is the 1700s, and the mail is pretending to be the communication of a very rich merchant and his associates. :) I think in terms of logistics it is feasible.
KeizerHarm
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-10-03T03:21:43.057Z
Okay, why would a very rich merchant be a spy (presumably working for a foreign country)? What's in it for him?
fat penguin
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-10-03T06:58:01.057Z
@fatpenguin That's what my windy plot is for to explain, and the story is 107 thousand words long at the moment :)
KeizerHarm
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-10-03T09:03:02.347Z
Just a quick reminder that rich mechants usually would buy into the government by donating a sizable sum of money. It's usually very good to have power on your side and can save a lot of trouble.
fat penguin
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-10-03T09:21:49.117Z
@fatpenguin It's not the government they're scheming against :) In any case, I am thinking more about the linguistic stuff for this question. One possible weakness I've found in further reading is that the phonetic component is sometimes shared among only few alternative characters so they may still be suspicious in isolation...
KeizerHarm
CC BY-SA 4.0
2024-03-02T17:52:15.207Z
@KeizerHarm Its totally up to you what to write, I only mention this because you seem interested in historical accuracy: merchants were viewed very poorly in old china, like bums leeching off society.  Only slaves and performers//brothels were viewed as lower,  and regular working class and farmers would have been more respected in the general eye.  Just keep in mind when writing a rich merchant role back then, its a tricky thing to portray casually as a spy, a person that already felt suspicious and hated, you might need a hiding in plain sight plot to be accurate.  :)
zagrycha
CC BY-SA 4.0
2024-10-27T13:03:16.640Z
@KeizerHarm - Just as a sidenote to zagrycha's comment: Despite the low status of merchants, the First Emperor would never have risen to power  if his father and he himself hadn't been sponsored by the richest merchant in the world, Lü Buwei.
mudskipper
<characters><traditional-characters><radicals><cipher>
Could this kind of a component-based null cipher be possible in Chinese?
# Could this kind of a component-based null cipher be possible in Chinese?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2023-10-01)

I'm writing a story set partially in historic China, and it involves a network of secret agents who seek to communicate over the mail in innocuous-looking letters. So I need a description of a pen-and-paper cipher that works for the Chinese language and (traditional) writing system. The story is not ultimately about the language or the cipher, it is just an element that I want to describe accurately.

For the plot I need to use a [null cipher](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Null_cipher); a way to conceal the secret message in a large amount of regular text by interspersing the secret stuff with lots of random stuff that together looks like it is about something different entirely.

In alphabetical scripts that would work by taking every n'th word, or every n'th letter, and putting them behind each other. This example from Wikipedia:

> HE GOT A GOOD HEART. SHOULD YOU BE HAVING PROBLEMS BE ASSURED THAT WHEN YOU HIT THE STREETS...

Taking every 5th word:

> HE SHOULD BE HIT

I'm considering, for this story, to say that this particular cipher mixed and matched components. That is to say, if the agent wanted to encrypt "steal", 偷; he would find another character starting with 人 (e.g. 仔) and another character ending with 俞 (e.g. 瑜), and write some text between to make it flow as a sentence. Then he'd just need to do so in a regular manner; let's say picking the first component of every 3rd character, then the second component of every 5th character, and maybe some extra cases for characters with even more components. Another agent who reads the text can read it selectively and get the secret message.

That is the level of explanation I'd use in the story; so the question is basically whether that, on the surface, looks feasible. I'm not going to write any actual ciphered text. I just don't want to do disrespect to any speaker of Chinese who comes across the story when I eventually put it online.

Rather than invent my own, I would have used an actual historic cipher, but they seem hard to find. The only one I could find attested is a [grille cipher](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grille_%28cryptography%29). That too is a null cipher, but it operates on the level of whole characters; and I presume that hiding the entire word "steal" in a text would be more suspicious than just hiding its components. Plus using components I can use it in a scene where someone explains the Chinese script itself, for a nice little educational bonus.

**Tags:** characters, traditional-characters, radicals, cipher
> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: [藏頭詩](https://zh.wikipedia.org/zh-tw/%E8%97%8F%E9%A0%AD%E8%A9%A9) or [嵌字文](https://zh.wikipedia.org/zh-tw/%E5%B5%8C%E5%AD%97%E6%96%87) are common in Chinese.  
> **username_0**: @Nobody Very helpful, thank you very much!  
> **username_2**: That's a rather obvious way to hide a message, though. Therefore it's not secure.  
> **username_2**: One thing you may want to note is sending mail was a rather difficult task in ancient China as there was no postal service for a very long time. Only the government had the facilities of sending mail. Civilians could only send mail via couriers in general.  
> **username_0**: @fatpenguin The setting is the 1700s, and the mail is pretending to be the communication of a very rich merchant and his associates. :) I think in terms of logistics it is feasible.  
> **username_2**: Okay, why would a very rich merchant be a spy (presumably working for a foreign country)? What's in it for him?  
> **username_0**: @fatpenguin That's what my windy plot is for to explain, and the story is 107 thousand words long at the moment :)  
> **username_2**: Just a quick reminder that rich mechants usually would buy into the government by donating a sizable sum of money. It's usually very good to have power on your side and can save a lot of trouble.  
> **username_0**: @fatpenguin It's not the government they're scheming against :) In any case, I am thinking more about the linguistic stuff for this question. One possible weakness I've found in further reading is that the phonetic component is sometimes shared among only few alternative characters so they may still be suspicious in isolation...  
> **username_3**: @KeizerHarm Its totally up to you what to write, I only mention this because you seem interested in historical accuracy: merchants were viewed very poorly in old china, like bums leeching off society.  Only slaves and performers//brothels were viewed as lower,  and regular working class and farmers would have been more respected in the general eye.  Just keep in mind when writing a rich merchant role back then, its a tricky thing to portray casually as a spy, a person that already felt suspicious and hated, you might need a hiding in plain sight plot to be accurate.  :)  
> **username_4**: @KeizerHarm - Just as a sidenote to zagrycha's comment: Despite the low status of merchants, the First Emperor would never have risen to power  if his father and he himself hadn't been sponsored by the richest merchant in the world, Lü Buwei.  

---

## 4 answers

### Answer by username_5 on 2024-10-27. Score: 1

我想我大概理解你说的是什么东西，类似的场景在中国共产党和中国国民党争夺中国政权的时候出现过。

中国的谍战电视剧或电影里有描述关于中国共产党地下组织怎么传递信息的：

当时是中国国民党在中国占主导地位，此时的中国共产党势力要弱，有一些间谍差不多就是用你说的方法传递接头信息的，比如，中国共产党会在县城的某个地方开个书店或药铺等门店，这个门店就是间谍和中国共产党组织街头传递信息的重要场合，然后某个人(其实就是间谍)经常去这个书店借书看，然后把一张纸条放到要归还的书里，当然这个纸条上面写的有文字，真正有效的信息包含在这张纸条中，这张纸条可以看作已经经过加密的文本了，事先双方提前约定好解密的方式，也就是怎么提取纸条中包含有效的信息，纸条上面写有一大段话，语句是通顺的，而且也是正常叙事，一个局外人看了觉得没什么，但是中国共产党组织的人员在有加密后的文本，并且知道解密了方式，那么可能会得出重要情报，比如解密后得出情报：明日9时日军物资达到北平火车战。

还有就是事先双方提前约定好解密的方式，这种解密方式可能会经常变动，以确保安全，加密后的信息隐藏在一整本书里，根据已知的解密方式，翻到某一页，找到第几行，第几个字，然后再翻到某一页，找到第几行，第几个字，这样重复几次或十几次就获得重要的情报信息了。

类似的传递情报的方式太多了，还有一种叫做`接头暗号`的东西，`接头暗号`在谍战剧中频频出现，当组织新派一个人与间谍见面时会对`接头暗号`，如果`接头暗号`对不上，对方就是假冒的接头人，所以在谍战剧中常常看到中国国民党对中国共产党的地下组织工作者严刑拷打，逼问`接头暗号`。


---

### Answer by username_6 on 2024-10-27. Score: 0

Do you mean something like this：

生入红尘种梦根，  
日来百祝共销魂。  
快推诗笔觅新句，  
乐满长笺始寄君。

Taking the first characters of each line, we have:

生日快乐

Of course, the possibilities are endless! If I put the date in my letter, take each character according to the date, perhaps?

I read just the other day, the Chinese, using a quantum computer, cracked military grade encryption! (Not really cracking, just quantum brute force.)

Still don't know why this question turns up on my phone, but not on my computer!


---

### Answer by username_7 on 2023-10-01. Score: 0

try “拆字”, or “離合”, the traditional methods to “cipher” characters

[What words exist that come from deconstructed characters?](https://chinese.stackexchange.com/questions/30227/what-words-exist-that-come-from-deconstructed-characters/30228#30228)

> a radical-based null cipher be possible in Chinese?

**no**. btw, it should be “component (部件)-based”

> involves a network of secret agents who seek to communicate over the mail

well, . . . a rant, or query here: the mail delivery “system” in the past is, quite slow. it may take weeks, or months to send a mail. no organisation would survive with such communication speed.

have fun :)

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: Well, there was "飛鴿傳書".  
> **username_7**: @Nobody, plus 魚雁   
> **username_3**: Also, getting stopped at a border of a territory to enter another , just to deliver your mail could get quite interesting over time haha.  
> **username_8**: I've always called components 偏旁, so I'm a bit surprised by 部件 here.  Are they both the same thing?  
> **username_7**: @Becky李蓓, “Are they both the same thing?” **no** radical (部首) normally refers to 214 radicals used in 康熙字典. or, 540 radicals used in 說文解字. **radical should be used for indexing only**  
> **username_7**: @Becky李蓓, in recent decades, people decompose a han character into component (部件), it’s not yet finalised, “根據中央研究院文獻處理實驗室的統計，所有的基本部件總數為1316個”, there’re thousands components used in han chinese. the total numbers varied, depends on who / where did it, including oracle bone script / bronze script, or not. that depends on who / where did it  here’s a wiki page, have a look: <https://zh.wikipedia.org/zh-hant/漢字部件#:~:text=正體字計441部件、簡化字計367部件%E3%80%82>  

---

### Answer by username_2 on 2023-10-03. Score: 0

There are several issues that I can think of. Take your example of 偷. How would the recipient know that the character 仔 is the one to start with, and not any other ones? How would he tell that he ought to end with 瑜 and not some other character?

I think a grille cipher is more doable.

> **Comments:**
> **username_0**: Counting. The algorithm could be simply to combine the first component of characters 1, 6, 11... with the second component of characters 3, 8, 13... it also can be much more complicated; special signs could change the order, maybe one needs to read the page diagonally, etc  

---

