No one can crack this code at CIA headquarters. Now, the answer is for sale

The Age

a day ago

When artist Jim Sanborn talks about Kryptos, his sculpture at the CIA headquarters, and the famously unsolved secret code engraved in its copper panels, he sounds as if he's talking about espionage, not art. The piece has 'destroyed marriages', he claims. It's driven 'unwanted guests' to his doorstep. Some aspiring code crackers have even 'threatened my life', Sanborn says, prompting the artist to outfit his home with panic buttons, motion sensors and cameras.
But after 35 years' guarding the work's secrets and dealing with the drama that comes with it, Sanborn is ready to hand over the code. In November, he plans to auction the coveted solution to the final passage, known as K4, at a sale coinciding with his 80th birthday.
'I could keel over at any minute and I'd rest easier if I knew that things were in control somehow,' he said.
In a letter to fans shared with The Washington Post, Sanborn wrote that the decision 'has not been an easy one', and acknowledged 'many in the Kryptos community will find it upsetting', but 'I no longer have the physical, mental or financial resources' to maintain the 97-character code and continue his other projects. He writes in the letter that he hopes the buyer keeps the code a secret, dropping a rare hint to his followers.
'If they don't then (CLUE) what's the point?' he writes. 'Power resides with a secret not without it.'
The sale, which will be run by Boston-based RR Auction on November 20 and the proceeds of which will go in part to programs to help the disabled, includes the original, handwritten plain text of the K4 code as well as other documents associated with the work. The secret would be transferred via armoured vehicle, the auction house said. It is expected to sell for between $US300,000 and $US500,000 ($460,000 to $770,000), according to Bobby Livingston, executive vice president at RR Auction, though he said he wouldn't be surprised if it fetched more.
'The way cryptocurrency has really taken off, there's a whole world out there that this appeals to,' he said.
Indeed, since Sanborn completed the sculpture in 1990, expecting its messages would be decrypted in just a couple of years, the piece has attracted a borderline fanatical cult following. It's forged communities of decoders, been a subject of academic research, graced algebra textbooks and appeared in film, books and television, sparking a level of interest that most artists could only dream of receiving.