American Experience: The Codebreaker tells the fascinating story of Elizebeth Smith Friedman, the groundbreaking cryptanalyst whose painstaking work decoding thousands of messages for the U.S. government would send infamous gangsters to prison and bring down a massive, near-invisible Nazi spy ring in WWII.
A suburban wife and mother who led a secret double life, her remarkable contributions to the science of cryptology would only come to light decades after her death, when classified government files were unsealed. But together with her husband, the legendary cryptologist William Friedman, Elizebeth helped develop the codebreaking methods that led to the creation of the powerful new science of cryptology and laid the foundation for modern codebreaking today.
Producer: Chana Gazit, Hilary Klotz Steinman, Vanessa Ruiz, Nancy Sherman
Executive Producer: Susan Bellows, Cameo George
Production Company: Steward/Gazit Productions
Production Year: 2020
Copyright Year: 2021
Rating: TV-PG
Director: Chana Gazit
Narrator: Kate Burton
Writers: Chana Gazit
Number of Discs: 1
Length: 60 minutes
Subtitled: Y
Subtitle Languages: English (SDH)