Puzzle - First to solve wins
For years I've had an idea in my head about a way to hide some information in a bunch of numbers. I actually got around to coding an implementation and figured I'd run a competition. The first person who figures out what the famous landmark is described by the second set of numbers below and posts the correct answer in the comments wins $100.
The hint
Here's a hint. The following numbers are a reference to the Eiffel tower:
5210101250
4788784776
4854656843
9662996569
7420856566
7596905059
5570804179
6020406044
0789756274
6022161771
8546664733
4630521474
9928452773
4303932493
6616761677
7547554707
1121221311
9497790774
0060622053
7263024151
0507022185
4728698925
2332573253
1551557171
2229322923
9148198081
5126514265
1685273941
8256975273
7409910740
7671873430
6222112260
0540070240
7477515747
3331020931
7733773473
0413111134
8968389236
6388033880
2067556705
6118526542
0458025942
6487387530
5455575168
6065322286
0111181190
7737774375
8558588585
9698956984
6488454384
8735986964
3332816180
3777359165
1413176980
7208834970
9835739922
3595790528
6030456577
1401730127
4099694560
3239139192
2575857258
8669966978
6316103176
1035505132
3717778037
8998939867
1578079072
6689429172
5273936832
3205030196
1845575132
2879197218
9093913099
7014773016
3238736287
4896836097
4280206617
9916537688
9371773098
6439617216
3307877365
2920153193
8242878465
3332873598
0000990063
3689938369
3777777553
7449903495
8319193118
2088388883
0385995193
3965455659
6480338680
0984324020
6385387515
4005968282
6985364787
0989305178
4990555454
0860168887
2462426224
2436334342
2412164367
0467342062
0420565427
2460661647
2917604574
4786547888
7560900965
6832430248
7181991111
8532524943
6582520322
4930509327
6788473187
8981287216
9987868991
9889889785
7077070849
7772777277
0938678047
0011180970
0909668185
2957478797
0759218971
The puzzle
Given the above hint, what famous landmark do the numbers below refer to?
1366995349
4795769190
4676612647
4665985627
4790979902
4665664466
8375050380
9647224626
1586981688
7043896322
0520596858
0192977887
0053897880
7775557726
2806767208
2988997825
7807077880
3228576352
7674767784
5995455459
4113101318
0855550285
9240050718
9740901280
6542837799
0430635494
6021865219
8881888498
8323384253
6544654426
1369993671
9518253493
8064184459
2946004498
6996097421
7025187358
4005663002
3569123922
8826753222
0117851924
1135553117
4990249902
9228181022
3336263325
6129621964
6086530586
1114415849
4011419470
3300930393
0970610880
7864508491
9548440890
2710239859
1928810489
2292131229
4949949039
1141441110
2909999980
4875033070
8269031230
5018239789
0130141180
8047049929
1817311713
6431941114
4516117155
8900198011
8211961927
1434169064
4401135671
6234750180
4810927135
3946090698
2075067130
1976323334
7145383171
8113771381
4986899488
2076067010
3045304430
7439097334
2750222270
7905077067
0176010010
8123555532
8727563733
7973550755
7370573356
2133508212
8155187981
6121524251
7727878777
8530330553
7900970900
7130907792
6254557142
9121337857
6936190688
6127127627
4730351780
3852272113
3666370617
0089652607
8177772708
3330531530
7977879687
7782272788
1171750117
5352496048
2858437232
2174135092
8894567528
8452332854
8594148858
4838488348
2127512575
5775151977
3839059701
5859471837
5725445181
9730148098
5830158850
6759477557
3429493949
0310991959
9785075079
Post the answer as a comment below. The first person to answer correctly with an acceptable explanation to how the answer was reached (rather than just a guess) wins $100, so make sure to use your correct e-mail address so I can contact you.
Note #1: People have noted that the numbers change whenever the page is reloaded. That's as expected. This puzzle is not an encryption as much as it is an obfuscation. That the numbers change is not important, as only the pattern in them will lead to the answer, which is of course constant.
Note #2: There was a bug in my post for a short while, which made the hint and puzzle basically the resolve to the same answer. This is fixed now. If you saved a copy the numbers before, just grab a fresh set.
Solved!
The second landmark was discovered by Batuhan Bozkurt, congratulations! The challenge has not yet been met entirely, though so I've decided to set a new challenge with the same method. The same $100 prize applies.
Redditor Bearasaurus has solved the final challenge too! For hints, check the followup post.
Comments
Big Ben
I'm afraid Big Ben is not it. But be sure to include some explanation as to how the answer was reached, so I know it isn't just a random guess.
I "solved" your puzzle, but I assume not in the way you wanted.
After giving it quite some hours, I failed to find any specific pattern (with a reasonable kolmogorov complexity) that would lead me to an answer. But in Reddit, you mentioned that you would be interested in statistical approaches that would lead to an answer (which I assume you are interested for increasing the security of the obfuscation?) so I exploited the fact that your website gives fresh batch of numbers at each reload so I grabbed about 1000 sets (with intervals in between, hopefully not causing trouble to your website, it handled the requests like a champ) and got to cracking.
Now your HTML formatting implies 10x10 blocks of data for each set. So that was a starting point when I first began looking at the problem. The grid is 70 x 20 so that implies 14 secret codes, 7 for each row.
I looked for what was common for each 10x10 block in each of the samples I gathered from your site. I found out that for each 10x10 block some digits occasionally never appears; for example in block 0x 0y, not all digits have to appear but one always appears at least once.
Once I looked at the remaining digits (that are common in all blocks at a particular coordinate), for the "hint", I was faced by these digits:
0485130
0021739
These are the coordinates in the form of degrees-minutes-seconds (dddmmss as you gave away generously in Reddit) of Eiffel Tower.
Once I ran the same process for the puzzle, the result was:
0295845
0310804
Which is the coordinates for the Great Pyramid of Giza.
Maybe this is disappointing, I don't know. If the website hadn't provided fresh batch of numbers, this method would not work. I assume, to strengthen the obfuscation, you could make sure one digit always appears at least once; but as long as the distribution isn't random, I suppose the answer could be extracted.
I've tried many approaches before this; I'm pretty confident that the pattern is not based on neighborhood relationships (as the answer can appear on edges, though wrapping around could be employed but still with it I failed to detect any patterns). I think it doesn't have anything (or much) to do with arithmetic on the digits (like summing / subtracting them). I tried various row/column patterns and couldn't come up with anything.
I also analyzed the 10x10 blocks containing the answer digits only once (so if the answer is 0 for that block, 0 appears only once in that block). But saw no obvious pattern at all. So this beats me in that regard.
If I am eligible for the prize for my answer, I would kindly ask you to donate it to the Doctors Without Borders foundation. If you are uncomfortable about it for some reason, you can choose to donate it somewhere else you see fit.
Thanks for the challenge, and although my curiosity has been partly satisfied, I'm still waiting for the answer that will allow me to solve this using a pen and paper using a single set of numbers.
Batuhan, the answer is indeed correct. The Great Pyramid of Giza is the one I was looking for. The method you used is indeed not the one I was hoping for, as you haven't actually figured out the way the coordinates are encoded into the sets of numbers.
Still, I'm not one to dictate how the problem should be solved. I will make a donation to Doctors Without Borders for $100 in your name and post proof that I have done so.
Since I would very much like for somebody to solve the method, I'm including this static problem for a second attempt, and another $100. Being in a comment, the following set obviously does not change and encodes a third landmark.
2626513077384364666346599932245309032974209496921885110948315551555613
6549028370497764766953274173448611231555969009312435020244378244262894
9308377132331493394457637801172312372974892873367485438142538547446457
5987478672136633636156339295109196283474021313920015080695500005010510
9318473400638833698356337893287640679475088481921818727043921551931599
5758758671181690400516397336912974972974211231362065019596695870416497
1701226107698865022553554534544375771374969996927993180831110067651597
3203310324331357320447629709425333533533932743923435767555759732852649
0008077080336367751344339394399228589625005440340517458583553308156594
7467243472134765226056779555595344734475199118911888022882025906466417
0332300493776667648725560571112261196221231229957486429403779342535143
1366338577707417047142278890548676887286598087756091175002210326130060
5863902088494574497542911473583959753975898054668946115111760583633056
3673921092972792959782223331128568968982838265801286279605628360969080
5301986352763553665223261861393193111359891776463941295493449120391390
0463999640662807648743557375531417213379281451584481179187119326988940
4352555243298062697573961379660934698929891289118894828988929160129317
1871110111741174649945428445570098658283038728302510575750510526949009
3326333663020967498782260828822839081251556075505536114445618120357157
5602990599311067698721073220721651596922796029092045295295550390501233
The challenge now is to find the answer and a step by step description of how to extract the correct digits from it.
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