A nostalgic hit built out of vintage pop-culture references captured the “If you liked that, you’ll like this” spirit of Netflix. In the summer of 2016, streaming TV was still figuring itself out.

The original version of this story appeared in Quanta Magazine. Imagine a town with two widget merchants. Customers prefer cheaper widgets, so the merchants must compete to set the lowest price.

Encryption rarely makes headlines, yet it quietly underpins almost every digital system that powers modern economies, from banking and aviation to healthcare and national security. Now, the UAE is ...