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:
7676826708
2226212436
5656755637
4799190197
7439897407
5233712697
0144018437
3426812787
8149710497
4099599959
4412012042
3765933553
2800770082
5319567011
2000592272
7762962294
2819923195
4362039190
1432632641
2328302239
8898484819
1381130318
9867630349
6660130811
4159630211
8108886819
8028376319
2168686296
3568418323
3860614632
7713349158
3163336313
3840648840
2913212215
7564888588
8768487847
7593605722
9135865842
5327255022
1321836076
5777555176
5738535785
8828285822
5955756597
4305004045
1975272795
0872275765
1579642833
1970529561
9882111988
5975557945
0550110501
1278688666
1227272272
6494711393
1214312401
4825537277
9815340215
9303593355
6415818848
2894389243
3815535335
4225727204
3101795174
9174191121
4411092871
6808695174
9099995171
8713738371
0610010604
7779881979
5885752827
9993779132
2886421864
0909501959
3446354430
6530674830
6130009135
9937371134
7311939332
2647131112
0596779069
7909171012
1825221185
0814310184
0964103276
0529127439
1515740418
7544381772
3916385095
5888853588
7737393076
8258880725
4177717472
5389453475
7035010735
4405213776
2229383072
2381120278
5079509750
0401090104
2486864807
7770770552
6079210550
1709501154
3369160104
3049460804
7087070014
9892120057
2810190064
0128387023
2111340291
9311131131
0292002900
1116222116
2824148481
2450332028
3145717257
3419439251
6408218980
5297234447
1499114980
4447434441
7335717353
2821210287
8884118450
The puzzle
Given the above hint, what famous landmark do the numbers below refer to?
5420460856
5760499112
0455519103
5465500885
0459798597
7467999447
7710571501
5657455666
5195995959
1115414657
1016016003
5965951590
6651551616
2795814550
6020700616
8508001691
2841314557
3749114713
8989308025
2993564724
1918154725
8275097055
5545794754
6622222196
8327558723
2290992029
5652767055
4422222222
2992122229
9453393043
3496333334
3496189741
4298899553
3495147692
1485254342
4493326748
2888442840
7047877870
1344134411
4666777474
4698127881
2647728285
1877574308
1066168017
4097525765
6556385944
4544901113
1565679293
6459989002
1444311433
5555655550
6959459959
4435354553
2564996652
6992399062
4939599333
0519911999
0388550358
6389944860
0612591544
4332384133
0918389063
4519319254
0625880202
1470300141
5346666456
8711977707
6711380959
6445862486
5421819021
0641959822
0460058407
8796467158
4536236459
6916517656
2628618554
8555555558
5440450404
7696167611
6668668176
9601016059
8224558422
3351532615
3133303187
9655992598
3306638897
3645097622
7113697681
3456392192
5370957692
0872278782
8044848804
1132233122
2553755557
8842706713
1144252264
1437166890
1555289047
1552170510
9121779123
4528442558
3733663273
9989539995
5987038513
3758669973
2786608053
9659209173
5269439913
4857685645
1211856218
4554225374
4333353438
5879275615
9393375325
2110353370
2864056415
0359955244
9868500859
0784292047
3265000047
5764295189
9580595082
4458800854
6119161149
9096990747
4974789741
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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