Boris Caesar Wilhelm Hagelin (2 July 1892 – 7 September 1983) was a Swedish businessman and inventor of
encryption
In cryptography, encryption is the process of encoding information. This process converts the original representation of the information, known as plaintext, into an alternative form known as ciphertext. Ideally, only authorized parties can decip ...
machines.
Biography
Born of Swedish parents in
Adshikent,
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War. ...
, Hagelin attended
Lundsberg boarding school and later studied mechanical engineering at the
Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, graduating in 1914. He gained experience in engineering through work in Sweden and the United States.
His father Karl Wilhelm Hagelin worked for
Nobel in Baku, but the family returned to Sweden after the
Russian revolution
The Russian Revolution was a period of Political revolution (Trotskyism), political and social revolution that took place in the former Russian Empire which began during the First World War. This period saw Russia abolish its monarchy and ad ...
. Karl Wilhelm was an investor in
Arvid Gerhard Damm's company
Aktiebolaget Cryptograph, established to sell
rotor machine
In cryptography, a rotor machine is an electro-mechanical stream cipher device used for encrypting and decrypting messages. Rotor machines were the cryptographic state-of-the-art for much of the 20th century; they were in widespread use in the 19 ...
s built using Damm's 1919 patent. Boris Hagelin was placed in the firm to represent the family investment. In 1925, Hagelin took over the firm, later reorganising it as Aktiebolaget Cryptoteknik in 1932. His machines competed with
Scherbius'
Enigma machines, but sold rather better.
At the beginning of
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
, Hagelin moved from Sweden to
Switzerland
). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...
, all the way across Germany and through Berlin to Genoa, carrying the design documents for the company's latest machine, and re-established his company there (it still operates as
Crypto AG
Crypto AG was a Swiss company specialising in communications and information security founded by Boris Hagelin in 1952. The company was secretly purchased for US $5.75 million and jointly owned by the American Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) a ...
in
Zug
, neighboring_municipalities = Cham, Baar, Walchwil, Steinhausen, Unterägeri
, twintowns = Fürstenfeld (Austria), Kalesija (Bosnia-Herzegowina)
Zug (Standard German: , Alemannic German: ; french: Zoug it, Zugo r ...
). That design was small, cheap and moderately secure, and he convinced the US military to adopt it. Many tens of thousands of them were made, and Hagelin became quite wealthy as a result. Hagelin fraudulently sold compromised machines to a variety of customers. Historian
David Kahn has suggested that Hagelin was the only cypher-machine maker who ever became a millionaire.
[David Kahn. ''The Code-Breakers'' (2nd Ed). New York, NY: Scribner, 1996.
]
Boris is the great-grandfather of
Carl Hagelin
Carl Oliver Hagelin (born 23 August 1988) is a Swedish professional ice hockey player for the Washington Capitals of the National Hockey League (NHL). Hagelin was drafted by the New York Rangers in the sixth round, 168th overall, of the 2007 NHL ...
, current
NHL
The National Hockey League (NHL; french: Ligue nationale de hockey—LNH, ) is a professional ice hockey league in North America comprising 32 teams—25 in the United States and 7 in Canada. It is considered to be the top ranked professional ...
player for the
Washington Capitals
The Washington Capitals (colloquially known as the Caps) are a professional ice hockey team based in Washington, D.C. The team competes in the National Hockey League (NHL) as a member of the Metropolitan Division in the Eastern Conference (NHL) ...
.
Patents
* (
B-21)
* (
C-35)
*
*
* (
CD-57
The (Hagelin) CD-57 was a portable, mechanical cipher machine manufactured by Crypto AG, first produced in 1957. It was derived from the earlier CD-55, and was designed to be compatible with the larger C-52 machines. Compact, the CD-57 measured ...
)
*
*
See also
*
C-36 (cipher machine)
The C-35 and C-36 were cipher machines designed by Swedish cryptographer Boris Hagelin in the 1930s. These were the first of Hagelin's cipher machines to feature the pin-and-lug mechanism. A later machine in the same series, the C-38, was designate ...
*
M-209
In cryptography, the M-209, designated CSP-1500 by the United States Navy (C-38 by the manufacturer) is a portable, mechanical cipher machine used by the US military primarily in World War II, though it remained in active use through the Korean W ...
*
C-52 (cipher machine)
The ( Hagelin) C-52 and CX-52 were cipher machines manufactured by Crypto AG starting 1951/1952. These pin-and-lug type cipher machines were advanced successors of the C-38/M-209. The machine measures . The device is mechanical, but when comb ...
References
Further reading
* Boris CW Hagelin, The Story of the Hagelin Cryptos, ''Cryptologia'', 18(3), July 1994, pp 204–242.
External links
History of Boris Hagelin*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hagelin, Boris
1892 births
1983 deaths
KTH Royal Institute of Technology alumni
Cipher-machine cryptographers
20th-century Swedish businesspeople
20th-century Swedish inventors
Swedish cryptographers
Swedish expatriates in Switzerland
People from Goygol District
Expatriates of Sweden in the Russian Empire