A word that does not appear in encoded message as a resynchronization marker

In case of variable-length codes a single bit error may cause loss of synchronization at the decoder and thus may lead to error propagation. Even if the decoder resynchronizes after a number of bits, it may have decoded incorrect number of symbols and may place the further decoded symbols at wrong positions. This paper describes a method for choosing such string of bits w_s that the decoder can always recognize any insertions of w_s into the encoded message and reestablish synchronization. w_s will be constructed of the shortest word that is not a substring of the encoded message. The method does not require any modification of the code.