Every day, the National Security Agency (NSA) prints a laminated card called the gold code, or the "biscuit." The card is filled with a gibberish string of alphanumerics, but buried somewhere inside is a code the President of the United States recognizes. It's the code he can use to launch America's nuclear arsenal. The NSA prints a new biscuit everyday and, until recently, it did so using a decades-old supercomputer. 

Like so much of America's nuclear arsenal, biscuit printing recently got an upgrade that was only revealed because the old equipment got dumped in a museum. 

The old machines used to print the biscuit are now part of an exhibit in the National Cryptologic Museum outside of D.C. According to the Wall Street Journal, the new exhibit is a sign that the old machines have been retired to pave the way for a brand new system. "The NC2 exhibits in the museum, along with the rest of the artifacts on display, were installed in the weeks prior to the museum's grand public opening on 8 October 2022," Jim McGaughey, a public affairs representative for the NSA, told Motherboard. "Selected artifacts were chosen about two years ago by the National Cryptologic Museum director and staff."

The museum was closed for two years during the pandemic. "We had the opportunity, during this time where we were down for COVID, when the entire country's nuclear code system went through a dramatic change in our technology," museum director Vince Hougton told the Wall Street Journal. "And so we have on display the servers and machines that created the nuclear codes for the United States from the 1980s all the way through a couple years ago."