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:
7320777702
0729892998
3685555883
5151911215
7669967212
4521859397
3539906011
5725811461
3525502963
7796703134
5615514005
4215100913
4190761278
7682178861
7470540050
5516771551
2295759527
4175414149
8398893878
6161151016
5964664259
0852578520
7565074818
2791798979
8342471358
5163678578
6365371296
8006168101
6973197366
7667868678
0553355350
7906125570
0577341339
8557623548
7973781775
8563755717
6888698866
3724323894
5356565653
3334371343
7248675843
3166378883
2291625354
7669801656
9007406366
6045490645
0902005208
6776777116
0433333043
3249630043
3319370713
2934494118
2993494608
3977327103
6968593282
2193008512
0201463332
1462092100
1761176711
2009992002
4030008539
1889498184
6626363280
4438086672
0978522316
3103421013
4647499329
0769996675
2922929019
2376222376
3323080312
7397191723
6221116126
1812286121
2179189172
5399399553
8233696627
4015216122
8118719127
6075616827
6455589176
2381658433
6006262031
1355162013
0923852016
1333153113
9493472419
0281508215
3440464036
1610668601
9137335074
6185511223
3888315027
5739836394
4416116644
8332338323
0960565067
4414412474
7171711797
8885858858
2605606626
1981991785
8999198512
3976491652
8617898810
8770408688
7864858650
2507401388
1734838833
0349500003
6716161676
7525975872
7314548901
6746844924
6586505316
0483968697
3715123309
1745448555
9565680700
7185870550
3130410575
6988118959
4790990774
1323772135
1902012190
0040040500
The puzzle
Given the above hint, what famous landmark do the numbers below refer to?
8120794263
2118391233
2443681578
0274291933
7288777288
4919991974
5115391533
6858388563
1885881808
5110101154
7787977977
6553959559
0045150541
7115748240
6515771794
7027956472
7555167243
5083106729
9167211076
6132464122
1089488091
4699994964
6062945325
9189421217
1169495830
9157477950
9169216309
8224098452
5480907322
4895894328
8595296456
8855598857
0268558026
2629996222
6262606452
5234424378
6114006114
0800348043
3348014380
8862772828
6660414343
3921178740
5686828144
1761544824
6554902114
3169294854
1489089018
7183728237
3453723189
3357935377
4569000564
3493134399
7689770687
1108558051
3608028026
1171627146
1621260321
2927977982
5896617224
5509607026
1984863222
9447127342
7006320184
3072948553
3652454981
3672126727
3672563956
3643993339
3287116132
1672556717
7372434333
3052922092
3626263266
6491442496
6444646976
5735372335
0816876320
1370442666
8663049976
5153266926
0356042236
8090020896
7775121657
2743773602
0522112065
9227870695
4957521096
3426913812
9311013059
6589223665
8406118411
4787774747
5911000551
5639131551
8481162329
8739740435
7411190405
4688711081
8681003893
8805730178
1231508812
8281543088
4831149788
4435775534
4871314334
1230723007
8822522225
8908101814
3712077314
3767831694
3030537557
8706271785
7778777684
5353151395
7133838617
8337676380
5774555757
5530134222
2788934719
9395335703
4550215702
9209990702
2720224205
4627242726
6262515263
9139134319
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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