 Before 1932, the Cipher Bureau had succeeded in solving an earlier Enigma machine that functioned without a plugboard, but had been unsuccessful with the Enigma I, a new standard German cipher machine that was coming into widespread use. In late October or early November 1932, the head of the Cipher Bureau's German section, Captain Maksymilian Ciężki, tasked Rejewski to work alone on the German Enigma I machine for a couple of hours per day; Rejewski was not to tell his colleagues what he was doing.
