Has the Zodiac cipher been solved?
Verdict summary
Partly. The Zodiac Killer's 408-character cipher was solved in 1969 by Donald and Bettye Harden, and the 340-character cipher was solved in December 2020 by David Oranchak, Sam Blake and Jarl Van Eycke. The shorter 13- and 32-character ciphers remain unsolved.
Neither solved message revealed the killer's name. The 340 solution was confirmed by the FBI as a valid decryption.
Sources: FBI statement, December 2020.
Has the Beale treasure been found? No. The Beale treasure, said to be buried in Bedford County, Virginia, has never been found. Its story comes from an 1885 pamphlet with three ciphers. Only the second has been solved, using the Declaration of Independence as the key, and many researchers consider the whole story a hoax.
Primary sources cited
- FBI statement, December 2020