Enigma coding machine from World War II fetches 212,000 euros at auction

An original 1943 Enigma machine has fetched £149,000 at auction in London, or £212,000 today. The Enigma is a cipher machine used by the Nazis in World War II to encrypt their communications.

The auctioned machine was developed by the company Heimsoeth & Rinke, which made all Enigmas. The military of Nazi Germany used the machines in World War II to encrypt the content of communications. The price at which the machine was hammered was three times the price the auction house had expected. The machine is therefore almost complete and in good condition, in addition, the buyer will receive spare cables and lamps.

The cipher machines known as Enigma were first introduced in the 1920s. The machine that was auctioned in London by Sotheby’s is model I, the model that was put into use by the German Wehrmacht in the early 1930s. Later, the Luftwaffe and the Kriegsmarine also started using this model, with some modifications.

The strong encryption of the Enigma machines was a major problem for the Allies during World War II. The encryption was eventually cracked by a team of British intelligence led by Alan Turing.