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:
9595659969
9154254792
9568556688
9830553508
9530982459
9534555642
2595663880
9834226118
9528699068
4408549952
5112517993
6060997482
8959498489
9353998593
5466646957
4991151959
4557717452
9824848982
3131646311
1182510588
6990069087
3811134180
9776839580
3127210188
9413164588
7169910387
4708134881
2978617179
9680219421
4318391479
2417297576
7777117471
5799591579
1205554021
1599119899
6627197126
1193130911
0710110763
0114102141
8988918893
7887030143
7429800865
9707332865
9881258713
3645512111
3344640782
3834680828
9724676132
2914366529
3392333392
2713023173
9944646944
8058668570
1834388434
1976016799
0317000070
4970779970
0000990000
5500781238
0970047736
5316048992
5500030701
0018635150
9862869688
7448558547
0354350385
3526992333
9352927540
2326367201
0360972602
7456918680
7448993732
5094294925
0136717930
7320636706
5388138858
0030783838
5306828001
9334735216
5198769895
0090602094
1200563415
5106724540
5760194994
4267544166
5765116571
4266126126
1210512215
9107790178
2706992799
6224626204
1310010111
6769669672
9997394397
6818296237
9225911614
0247261397
1182910318
8334226131
5095909751
7882062708
8565156214
6511152156
4249459056
7774376741
4030699151
7483809006
2160452744
5063470321
5852890534
0074956594
5644856696
0676770676
3959393594
1355556136
6787276321
5265251624
8393949536
9425060950
9397507680
9495360061
3397993839
9393399393
8925382235
6908596095
9495545549
The puzzle
Given the above hint, what famous landmark do the numbers below refer to?
9260029220
5939595595
0034900090
8994794876
9964987245
1269956471
9064715760
8914013000
0969797615
2295705769
7115737469
1178908211
3285581225
4295752797
1185551515
2380929910
7118988971
3978799993
2275188551
3607414507
2905882277
3161698503
3324112341
5524284257
6459691656
5555515503
8555888515
2847822247
6619969691
2433343323
6955996696
2953941071
3713916918
6845860441
3411791536
2925070226
7108111826
8601531146
6671519245
2672525461
8776575767
0615561011
6502363923
2031112212
4108901048
1936001944
6408609943
2416350873
6331966942
1656333366
2431032142
6469664676
4316666466
8608989989
3369635636
3883282308
6494261294
6191919069
7443235394
9725811065
9506985035
1302217205
3245512074
6093909669
0891191108
9743370444
9876373776
9873928723
9796357254
9791312965
9893681353
9899110073
2065066020
0611616019
6699798796
7773336175
7015496020
0813936172
6151632020
2391536027
6279896770
4512409959
0618461681
8612685388
4807123542
4677174741
0507171000
6874446644
8812448480
9216696116
8490743277
1395243774
3413598724
6576632624
2275552727
8242338234
3737443273
9630969394
9988998692
7198956514
0918915625
4915912087
0915765289
6667776667
7198119779
0915909930
0429664962
8955669956
2111611671
3794575574
1734134314
4253353235
1151101326
4791743604
3113593723
1254637910
2251592810
0888787055
8888888408
7237727263
1008753708
6675253468
3387223755
4238853404
3037481008
5035227058
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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