1. A method of searching encrypted digital works comprising the steps of: applying an encryption function to individual elements within a digital work to form a set of encrypted index elements; storing the encrypted index elements as an index for the encrypted digital work, wherein storing the index elements comprises joining the index elements to form a single string and then separating the single string into an array of similar length data units and replicating a predetermined length of data components found in each data unit in the following data unit in the array; receiving a plain text search term; applying the encryption function to one or more individual elements within the search term to convert the search term into one or more encrypted search term elements; identifying an encrypted digital work having an index containing one or more encrypted index elements that match one or more of the encrypted search term elements; and returning search results of the identified encrypted digital work.