![puzzle](http://uploads.neatorama.com/images/posts/371/52/52371/1347638705-0.jpg)
When
the Berlin Wall came down, the East German secret police, known as
Stasi, knew their days were numbered, so they began to shred their
extensive files. And when the shredders broke down, they tore documents
into pieces. What they left behind is the biggest jigsaw puzzle ever.
Twenty years later, little progress had been made reconstructing
documents from the
six hundred million pieces of paper, according to Joachim Haussler of the present Stasi archives authority.
So
now the authorities are turning to technology. Computers, says
Haussler, are "quicker, cheaper and can match and remember things humans
can't". The particular computer taking on the task is the "ePuzzler"
made by the same people who invented the mp3 player - the Fraunhofer
Institute in Berlin.
Bits of torn paper of all shapes and sizes are taken out of the sacks, ironed flat, then scanned.
Each
piece, however small, is given a computer file into which is entered
any information about, say, paper colour, handwriting or print on it,
any significant acronyms that might link it to a particular Stasi
office.
Then a complex mathematical programme is brought into
action matching that information and the paper's shape with other
fragments from among the millions.
Read how computers are reconstructing East German history, and what is being revealed, at
BBC News.
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