1 z y x w v u t s r p o n m l k j i h g f e d c b a the playfair cipher is a manual symmetric encryption techniue and was the first digraph substitution cipher the scheme was invented in eighteen hundred fiftyfour by charles wheatstone but bears the name of lord playfair who promoted the use of the cipher the playfair cipher uses a five by five table containing each letter in the english alphabet exactly once except which is missing the table constitutes the encryption key to more easily remember the table it is typically generated from a key phrase first fill in the spaces in an empty table with the letters of the key phrase dropping spaces and duplicate letters then fill the remaining spaces with the rest of the letters of the alphabet in order the key phrase is written in the top rows of the table from left to right for instance if the key phrase is playfair example the encryption key becomes