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:

9249519475
0630680653
8897787928
1821682126
5855957938
6737457423
0072659723
1341157926
2235582928
3750480928
8438828687
6655348117
6097196187
6878298427
8090496007
1919991117
8608996008
4444744627
9771799117
4648488487
6164111111
4042000444
6169966996
4111410141
9837938839
6861947857
6162944720
9169163086
9349928624
4164405627
1298987890
1530835503
4965897432
1364893987
1908940008
8764978769
2200802828
4138833833
2365965252
1999999399
2321417187
7175467587
5373368477
5940418274
3810010999
7199794174
7317717283
9099969989
1844018094
4794940497
3314696431
3406063804
0440990804
7168551607
5343373543
9963853804
6340890504
8744293844
4550476534
5273992804
6547831028
1059981666
7865930965
9901010948
0405635645
8373330628
1811601968
8996985695
0041431024
4466466446
5599355293
3303606930
3444242834
2089200298
2765757725
5088450220
1909057838
5800907236
7052506834
5005102235
7036497701
1938737747
5626737745
4999993791
6178497317
6773793767
7177757711
8899928397
5448010845
8466633086
8147717827
8021212000
4633836338
6458255668
4226334233
8623342940
8021277448
6856248627
8127820021
4646331044
9280002288
3021333036
6954859864
8763636677
3345335443
3944302139
6354858552
3344725501
9743861030
8941357256
7835072288
8775835883
0400855838
2376025863
1409077288
2263772263
8735857888
9533535889
6737763773
3558535238
4939333447
4899435335
1925461777
4289437731
5235925347
1936933933
1135633813
5825388325
4289484844
4489444948
9384033084
7046600664
3615819883
7998598598
3157377735
3384561017
3917002257
3944025777
9642529002
3656850440

The puzzle

Given the above hint, what famous landmark do the numbers below refer to?

9332773240
8206143042
3309062144
8032093860
6002164745
9089799087
8004000400
6572555555
3826062686
6339136239
3687711221
5302395149
5932914225
9074970108
4883651205
5202770525
4554885474
1550551109
1194494418
1110111251
0105005114
1898118114
5566756675
0700063070
0755795075
7786093075
9457965074
2897868315
7068505115
7855098114
7432281577
5401545829
7208231847
4895389223
9255525789
7852557882
7338533335
4442744777
9200333000
5495246552
1939438896
4132413559
8032450016
8238785888
9032702347
1139771331
8937489892
9030433443
4262002204
2816000008
2821452232
2727499723
9078107654
9437357412
8832165645
9771171999
7319313913
8838444883
2427527759
2532662326
5879707773
7849025506
2476723209
2096107206
5220433946
7303337903
2290026709
1414501546
4343243223
2685585506
8775757789
7171716710
8880000808
2600505028
7976734679
1886815808
7608816629
5218806709
7431837808
7039887720
8923021381
6022313547
8023083041
8640061213
8043584759
6088550888
6943096305
8420323828
1025002205
8072278082
9939979893
8444585214
2721876285
9333239432
1215571250
7694475230
1164379414
1271179285
0161983292
9548379895
8029382232
7179871117
9337193937
8550335358
6193399739
6570180235
6197308557
6179322484
9357372878
3370342001
9809558088
8250050355
0795997997
8405544885
8175557771
8200589254
8775573996
8475531959
8475597741
8109659804
6235249816
2542157109
2707130837
8264268709
8232542849
8244118412
6545666466
6730806366
2762522566
1537250225
4396555439
3029030002
2786624266
2752155121
1082710871
3029569526
2006014796
3796174376
2086658836
4096546654

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.

Tags:

Comments

Colin Edward

Big Ben

Steven Don

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.

Batuhan Bozkurt

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.

Steven Don

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