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Cryptologist
Dr. Erich Hüttenhain (26 January 1905 - 1 December 1990) was a German academic
and cryptologist. During WWII,
he was head of the cryptanalysis unit at OKW/Chi, the cipher department of the
High Command of the Wehrmacht (OKW).
He was considered a leading cryptanalist of the
Third Reich [1].
After the war, he worked for the new US-established German
intelligence service Organisation Gehlen (OG)
and later also for its successor, the
Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND).
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Erich Hüttenhain studied at the universities of Marburg, Frankfurt and Münster.
At the latter he graduated in mathematics in 1933. In 1936 he began working
for OKW/Chi, where he was tasked with setting up a cryptanalytic
research unit. He eventually became Executive Council Head of Group IV
Analytical Cryptanalysis [1].
During WWII, Hüttenhain and his staff enjoyed several successes. They managed
to break the Japanese Purple machine, and also (temporarily) succeeded in
breaking certain American rotor machines – like the
M-138A
and the M-209 –
whilst these were being used in North Africa.
Apparently, he had not been able to break the American
high level cipher machine SIGABA.
After the war — being a high value target — the Americans took him to the
USA for interrogation by the Target Intelligence Committee
(TICOM).
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Whilst in the US, he built a machine for breaking the Russian rotor machine
encryption (which had also been done by the Germans during WWII).
In 1947, he returned to Germany where he worked under the pseudonym
Erich Hammerschmidt to establish the
Studiengesellschaft für zur Förderung Wissenschaflicher Arbeit
(SFWA), literally translated: Study Society for the Promotion of Scientific Work.
In literature, the SFWA is also known as Studiengesellschaft für wissenschaftliche
Arbeiten, or Society of Scientific Work (SSW).
It fell under the authority of the new US-established German intelligence service:
Organisation Gehlen (OG).
In 1956, Organisation Gehlen (OG) was succeeded
by the Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND).
On 17 February 1957 the first plan for a overall federal
cipher authority was drafted, but it took two years
before the plans were approved. Finally, on
2 February 1959, SFWA became the
Zentralstelle für das Chiffrierwesen (ZfCh),
an independent organisation under BND Directorate II of which
Hüttenhain remained head until his retirement in 1970.
He was succeeded by Wilhelm Göing.
ZfCh is known today as
Bundesamt für Sicherheit in der Informationstechnik
(BSI).
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Erich Hüttenhein is one of the architects of
Operation RUBICON — the secret purchase
in 1970 of the Swiss manufacturer of cryptographic equipment
Crypto AG (Hagelin),
by the German BND
and the American CIA.
From 1970, Crypto AG
was jointly owned by BND and
CIA,
and from 1994 to 2018 solely by the CIA
[3]. It enabled them to influence the cipher equipment by weaking the
algorithms (i.e. create backdoors) in order to gain intelligence from more
than 100 countries.
➤ More about Operation RUBICON
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Related subjects on this website
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Dr. Erich Hüttenhain is mentioned on the above pages on this website.
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© Crypto Museum. Created: Monday 15 January 2018. Last changed: Wednesday, 05 August 2026 - 19:42 CET.
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