This is the home of the University of Southampton National Cipher Challenge. From here you can register for the competition, and post your own comments or queries about it. If you have any questions or remarks you don't want to post publicly you can This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. The competition will start with the first Challenge on Thursday 5th October which will be published in the Black Chamber. You can read more about the format of the competition on the Standing Orders page. Messages will be released at 3.15pm and you will have at least a week to submit your answer, though you get extra points for submitting early. No need to rush as we will be dividing the week up into blocks of time worth equal points. Again you can find out more about this schedule and the scoring system on the Standing Orders Page, but if you want to schedule a maths club or other meeting with your team, after school Thursdays is a good time to consider. Meanwhile if you like our poster you can download a copy to print out, and if you would like to explore ciphers a bit before the competition you can download our Teachers' Pack.

A bug in Drupal caused ALL comments (not forum topics, just the comments added to them) to be deleted. We have backups and have restored all the comments posted before midday 11th October. Sorry if yours is lost, if it was a gem please post it again. Comments are now open again. Truly sorry for the inconvenience.

Here are the most common problems: 1. You misspelled your email address 2. Your inbox is full so our mail to you bounces 3. Your ISP or mail server thinks our mail is spam and deletes it 4. Your mail client thinks the mails is spam and deletes or misfiles it In particular you probably should add our email address This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. to your address book. (cheast we tried replying to you several times but got the message: Message undeliverable. "Your email address is not listed in the Address Book" from the Yahoo mail server)

This site badly needs an FAQ (frequently asked questions). Does anybody care to write one? It would answer the commonly repeated questions like "How do I submit my solution?" and could grow over time. We will edit it and post it, but we need someone (or a team) to write it. Email us at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. if you would be interested in joining the team.