Britain's Spy Agency Is Making Apps for Kids

​The UK intelligence agency GCHQ (Government Communications Headquarters) isn't usually known for its friendly attitude and sense of fun. But just in time for Christmas, it's been playing Santa's workshop and has created a new toy: a cryptography app for kids.

Cryptoy, released today for Android tablets, is described on the Google Play ​store as a "fun and educational app" that "teaches you about the mysterious world of cryptography."

It's an attempt to get school students interested in cryptography, and was put together by students on placement at GCHQ for the Cheltenham Science Festival, itself an outreach initiative. While GCHQ claims a commitment to increasing uptake of STEM (science, technology, engineering, and maths) subjects, it's also keen to help specifically build cybersecurity skills in the UK.

Improving cybersecurity knowledge is a key target in the UK's Cybe​r Security Strategy, and GCHQ—along with other government departments and institutions—has a host of education ​initiatives to get people interested young.

But, as Stua​rt Dredge at the Guardian points out, the agency isn't keen for people to know too much about encryption (at least not if they have no plans to work for them, presumably). Last month, GCHQ director Robert Hannigan complained that tech companies were making too many tools freely available to people and, by extension, terrorists.

In an opinio​n piece for the Financial Times, Hannigan wrote that "Techniques for encrypting messages or making them anonymous which were once the preserve of the most sophisticated criminals or nation states now come as standard."

He took particular umbrage at those "proudly advertising that they are 'Snowden approved,'" adding, "There is no doubt that young foreign fighters have learnt and benefited from the leaks of the past two years."

The Cryptoy app won't exactly teach kids to carefully hide their cyber tracks from detection; it's based on historical examples of cryptography like the Enigma code and Caesar cipher (where letters are represented by another letter a certain number of places along in the alphabet).

It's not the first government-backed crypto app. In 2011, the NSA re​leased NSA Cryptochallenge, a free game for mobile devices "designed to educate young adults on career opportunities with NSA and recruit the best and brightest to support NSA's cybersecurity initiatives."

And in case you were wondering, GCHQ states that Cryptoy "is purely an educational app, and doesn't require any permissions to access personal data or enhancements to be made to your device when installing."