Who first chose the names Alice and Bob for players A and B?
Quoted from Wikipedia:
The Alice and Bob characters were invented by Ron Rivest, Adi Shamir, and Leonard Adleman in their 1978 paper "A method for obtaining digital signatures and public-key cryptosystems".
Rivest, R. L.; Shamir, A.; Adleman, L., A method for obtaining digital signatures and public-key cryptosystems, Commun. ACM 21, 120-126 (1978). ZBL0368.94005.
Allow me to mention that since the players in effect adopt the roles of the quantifiers $\forall$ and $\exists$, as Bob has a winning strategy just in case for every move for Alice, there is a reply by Bob, and so on, some logicians have preferred to use alternative names that would better highlight this connection.
When I was a graduate student attending lectures of Adrian Mathias in Berkeley, he used the names Abelard and Éloïse, after the famous couple and their love letters at court (made more interesting by the fact that Abelard was a logician). The advantage, you see, is that the names begin with A and E, aligning with $\forall$ and $\exists$.
Another example, of course, would be Adam and Eve, although Mathias preferred Abelard and Éloïse. In truth, however, I recall that Mathias was not fully satisfied with either of these examples, and sought additional famous couples, whose names begin with A and E. Does anyone know any?
Let me collect here the examples of A/E names of famous pairs contributed in the comments and elsewhere.
- Abelard and Éloïse, the famous lovers. Abelard was a logician
- Adam and Eve, from the creation myth
- Anna and Elsa, from the Disney film, Frozen
- Arwen and Elessar (otherwise known as Aragorn), from the Tolkien saga. Connected with infinity and eternal life.
- Albert and Elizabeth, British royals
- Ares and Enyo, Greek gods of war
Please add more in the comments!