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:
8567290964
4482601724
4552266529
0461967887
0782999920
4562224246
8531387558
4450604454
8661998696
7486947987
9194211119
5499199919
5501999505
5191160158
9501153458
6489294607
5181053314
5519294510
0130000153
5522855872
8884444828
5470115674
0541054823
5340700678
5778759872
4205805674
2900190828
3998951635
0698935801
3613735313
0698984923
0698778697
4702927042
0713110078
3438933943
3690290062
0817961159
4808930319
4818631296
6011523674
3811930913
1018901111
2893588993
6057666757
4705004070
0481318484
6013411162
2427872728
3551753775
0551721793
0033893792
3538813953
3407865733
2588389851
7650829307
0578828044
7951191671
7541786677
2951115151
6872222978
6670766777
6818816811
7540104401
9107380047
2216380353
5486904669
5107367810
9436931936
3104000340
5354355533
2015921950
2187328372
7250752045
8434056374
1912852216
6011254066
9355559275
0644644063
4441429144
6655656286
8531382315
1422558105
6087408087
6152629859
2723452180
5559557295
0000202080
3885358137
2922059029
8032020850
3844310831
3817992187
9347157296
3947107092
9904190919
4338343033
7957155711
3075953553
3842923449
1598324403
6134570430
6453664568
0925474546
8874573548
0888464580
0262020406
4426484463
0450340535
7792714515
7496706684
6455362386
6492741256
3495335435
8656658569
2492599229
6807800808
7787777778
1101529622
1964399016
1134299874
8908703295
0401774470
8434545844
1155655566
5434735455
1968335996
The puzzle
Given the above hint, what famous landmark do the numbers below refer to?
5333535036
7383113717
0232707932
5303353560
1853253430
2001115957
5233933947
8351833930
3599013437
1861613861
6400504956
1000040010
2600770926
5706410076
5084880820
8860410420
8863816910
3230273120
5540348419
7973233296
5190375528
5299326224
1112111111
9990799790
7279572792
6574345713
5243135515
3450755953
3605783490
8006712456
3560746812
3155515355
3696363966
5065665065
8524724558
8300707023
7079779990
6174661466
3863333663
5913515515
6973789336
6179389412
7113669346
2163767839
7404735264
4004550494
5717158771
0661560851
1872711748
5035254808
8330261701
4304760409
7606461708
6752388741
7854414758
4334535194
7770097600
9197777895
6303677800
3516435160
4097637738
7404637134
0274895890
8984149984
5060500006
8930686563
9355935595
9050504707
9970115004
9934009101
8954502406
8684928952
1191041207
1701887014
8111121118
7997979379
1806271614
0951371112
8095921272
1087871614
2436573362
6644644646
7970667306
7530800783
6433535335
7640588998
8643563375
6930688166
8929832133
8530610992
2253301253
5134307446
5157752172
6920540921
9724332945
7297772777
6127881177
2133532133
5950759977
4630535801
8614646274
9089542240
8189782955
4189558458
0473770073
8384543888
9009909200
8610606060
9478477747
5040900960
8939888989
6415914645
9472969473
5045994753
9440067409
6040430938
9918959729
1166151861
5525252205
5870444570
9716774691
2383854667
4926750647
6404741687
4736771567
3323274505
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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