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:
9465532394
8650137960
8110166569
9405184808
5400155507
9115555511
1871177117
8459188988
1165511551
5044445950
1660460409
7822272892
3590110953
6599210959
1193768453
4761250434
8414908204
3667778833
3378775490
8500066320
2776069990
3570859391
5273756327
6669965590
4999929492
9796969998
6277177261
7777017075
4707470704
7437767467
0796970696
6351017606
9094490495
1339696075
2655615065
0492377075
1184045787
9845905057
4684995757
3027295759
9699595909
4737939747
9455447159
7299909027
7753335759
7884987747
5744257447
4910590101
2005750050
5214741207
2260773801
2940249384
2000554375
5845767702
7958479875
8152774610
1478274902
4793459815
0058559805
1255115512
7024029570
9444974609
1018880910
6849936652
1733075713
7712966409
6731922898
6410991060
4831014024
1443841841
0839909809
7799779977
8220002182
6303303633
5503885303
3578737355
1526236303
5926006393
3542685103
1998206330
9010855390
5053060035
3071434407
9348397384
9009919101
4807430131
1062060201
1396164381
4497194581
2882817505
3980490519
0780661990
3987661243
0957928575
0800999008
2087674886
9957657595
4086644004
3441434444
8251395553
6041336096
8791721517
9559523987
6451111551
8249121188
5065366360
9791077900
8591558154
0915113112
8212815018
3278802330
6218743299
8843330883
3278782278
6412814226
0275352007
3985899898
3875563967
0804559439
2683565594
2608546500
0208558080
2881721824
6697596966
3873588335
0325660600
The puzzle
Given the above hint, what famous landmark do the numbers below refer to?
1501515151
7766737567
5959583539
1515550010
3485853019
7325885187
7808390512
2566015550
1446723167
5274676472
1795515791
8292888986
1968799698
1274566839
0698617422
0275845441
8772759972
8763795802
5246313915
2972184168
8744886644
9851634633
1944194913
8744334348
8668686668
3176513765
8929889234
0562666621
2834008002
2877580375
0829502659
1812991111
0574004440
2566566645
5839439893
6527662575
2445444445
8396228323
4682022860
5368156151
8608128125
5386176541
4602108711
2642176936
5458208807
4606057531
4249151876
8588971849
9696077146
1115351131
8383388332
6533775349
7131371837
7766177516
8194478457
5551513550
5421978773
3941872457
2757718527
8004774708
7262993226
2799432479
3997377953
4933692192
0608493802
0223691689
1024892182
2112771182
9899990899
6069161490
2702992107
7780602672
2590073376
2288196132
8592223512
8598349293
8580338835
7078000858
8564248848
1072110111
2391433434
2000440049
1221122212
4573253342
1427777777
1363184173
1473423187
2200264215
1301417937
4200610921
2992629630
8555362538
2129293281
0006113048
7440893860
0506129641
0211723668
2220799441
7421862088
6999612196
2323820483
8088770838
6666999664
7646672448
3198676688
5112722664
2416670634
3581213433
1467447464
5428525422
9411744416
2341332231
9441309738
2467350509
7447852620
1441319341
1447737389
8684974036
3441847134
7994017835
8732217836
9319935196
1000517035
4104174110
8448444838
5315561255
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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