The Enigma Cipher Centre presents how the German Enigma code was deciphered by Polish mathematician Marian Rejewski. The focus is on the Polish contribution and not the subsequent work by Alan Turing at Bletchley Park.

The exhibition also offers visitors an insight into encryption methods developed over centuries.

You could easily miss the unassuming entrance.

The entrance hall is more impressive.

You’ll hear a lot about Marian Rejewski and his colleagues through displays and at least one short film.

A lot of effort has gone into the displays. Many are interactive and encourage you to solve various crypto puzzles – for over half of them it wasn’t clear to us what we were supposed to do, despite the instructions being in multiple languages.

I’m surprised the curators didn’t include a series of escape rooms, where crypto puzzles must be solved. That would have resulted in our being trapped in each room unless we got smarter, or they improve the instructions.

I think that the most important information about the Enigma machine is that you could type the same word twice and Enigma would produce a different encrypted word each time. That wasn’t obvious from visiting the exhibition. Here is an Enigma simulator https://www.101computing.net/enigma-machine-emulator/

Visiting the Enigma Cipher Centre is like a school trip. Visitors will need to have at least some interest in WWII and cryptography.

Centrum Szyfrów Enigma / Enigma Cipher Centre
Ul. Św. Marcin 78
61-809 Poznań

kontakt@csenigma.pl
+48 61 888 45 12
+48 61 888 45 00

https://csenigma.pl/en/