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:
2877767287
5377237652
3157191537
1899319939
4164011982
4597517557
7123239959
6769819237
3084697207
6656678665
9799666979
4112024106
0873779008
8143279409
0827876475
5155464665
9064824446
7771066106
8863573907
7162700511
2169253315
4069253911
1353553315
9922202901
0710050410
4734847384
3055373504
7556276776
7297279022
7927191777
2453755332
8257748964
7227195664
7273286453
6455794599
7756114289
7727927777
5358778633
8028338028
9405350595
9057706872
7488215143
8308391514
5027331823
7308933191
8348680363
1241817482
9858709785
7556575706
8544237385
5365687083
9484930365
9801500362
1730913706
7424420456
8840580116
7036177055
0031568122
1040111410
0334339344
7456647646
4721444442
6861551665
9808008899
3044848344
2763977727
1266111611
2844103580
9256995109
1063163278
9246492815
5703040645
9873111898
2941111849
1740202114
5693151551
2493167109
9291113018
2843260810
9773238187
9443131808
8888182999
4837926628
7751996535
0780704137
0608770006
8731217888
7888070788
4750105067
8226992296
7215373353
2237772372
7373837373
8193911880
7233308776
7362212851
8397257793
2132741745
7375992161
2462442626
0110410145
9072500277
3741713174
0716703881
9146443573
2510855528
3312883637
2172553562
0334119477
6371124177
1335459172
3305362021
3378373387
0941692400
1735177137
6008460000
2334662264
9998378049
1318349089
6391444903
1489368511
5399350933
1428343388
6088288828
9985449489
5391699953
The puzzle
Given the above hint, what famous landmark do the numbers below refer to?
5691581203
0636670253
3882589968
7291471903
9977971921
6545441658
0228062208
5322369223
6824284263
4408007044
5711511771
1582828888
6517317116
4388500183
4772080741
4587634072
1568502976
1318811327
2494689073
6571689072
9313114577
1661637191
2144114492
9017700177
9911119071
5333636053
7776787671
1430461267
8165899284
9141015441
3483019210
5617595067
0110818010
4246646260
4114499441
4261461284
0360330630
1947992999
4240940924
3626772323
6770322652
4077758125
3745984534
0646958426
6747946495
9110011380
3865446583
4599589645
2922999282
7799019382
5747381500
4315816445
6565899206
0248519380
6125737587
8975737928
1531617228
7130635513
1718717188
0707001507
3953110523
3852535328
8846684916
9506162812
8759012816
6920011710
4715832612
7177717896
1900771910
2022272802
3321232612
6665669866
2303923978
0855680605
2356552536
9985999558
6567090556
1903692576
7634259156
0750552974
3661999978
3799440579
6860008086
4248428144
4411511584
6090411174
9730160586
8754400584
6927608079
1505500974
4757756705
4934679974
1953499596
1961787341
1854318435
3173553333
2961766579
4737637336
9657445569
9659575803
9720083895
9650409231
4719308108
4659595955
1810110118
8914333034
9731479744
9129619911
0400279964
2631199942
0587118330
8612899444
5399339340
4236426437
9908098490
4644647962
7790779034
6766791867
7204007422
8610829608
5707750637
5977093125
3333350427
8906467638
2468157162
5542460834
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.
Post a comment