Reinhard Wobst studied mathematics at Technical University of Dresden and obtained his PhD in the field of scholastic processes in 1980.  He now works as an independent programmer for scientific and industrial applications in C/C++ as well as script languages. 

In 1980, he conducted his first experiments with cryptographic algorithms.  This hobby has led to numerous articles discussing cryptography, through to security consulting and security software development.  All this writing has resulted in this book, which is now in its third edition in the original German and is published here in English for the first time.