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:
8591616566
4551051151
6180706868
9334597954
4134707438
4374560146
8537098360
6587562769
9597506228
9963767379
3498444888
8910482914
7986393968
8460380135
7998474481
7984407163
6986364980
8468482685
0345894958
5366565912
9964582988
8362585753
9015915905
5046444400
0763887301
4962525969
8340686333
5365559383
1167892216
1525866582
1127762717
7609599750
1065806115
0167467460
1327771027
5956256525
6117526983
2326853979
6605283779
1630832785
4449332944
5787588785
5928958279
3748363584
6939326639
5058555305
7767272767
5590550955
0606770663
0425655695
3427780663
9209570953
6603082333
0261575667
8560221579
2779385967
5618253258
8469300447
5563773575
8716467181
2570407555
8678277188
0479330707
4582754819
7840000683
7839598863
3793094611
8992794879
1606678610
8002002871
8633008663
4044450414
1803308311
4344263424
1110011071
6664334466
2515458018
2765161166
0103783426
0087554411
2953068411
0145151110
3572662633
9616111766
5915771555
0613747606
2149600243
9446118349
0156697014
9475115348
7100006707
9544353544
3060563000
6759377356
6554586581
5949351362
9169189492
3507596932
5140158230
2951719255
5446364044
3769877787
2616336662
5716386544
2418797763
2661358481
5516817575
5616324649
6758776666
8585188555
6126466663
9352939292
8125925931
6158773816
8395703602
6552665093
9588952078
3578878785
1669261666
9193131311
5557575555
3699109886
1561291484
1159256940
9671211354
1167091945
The puzzle
Given the above hint, what famous landmark do the numbers below refer to?
0354023831
1048372610
2281159800
4991279802
7889179818
5908958920
4269494631
0018173810
3322023502
7206972907
9698596650
8741711818
7186331683
8602589793
8792158228
9152932279
9758198086
7088928962
4529428069
1236286347
4375423650
1959503307
1926599616
9279427995
6359156535
4059699055
1135225153
7445089762
7589487993
7239498352
0939386511
3835355305
7549007970
0486303430
7701401117
4924024400
9091045910
2292662162
4444787444
2838332386
8646432486
5179941466
7286542370
9923341416
5058332486
4408311595
8405561504
5904916104
5601211694
2132116293
6616661605
5992917954
5919221905
5554220554
0610901006
5609896959
3735553337
8144558565
0604784334
5104951089
5179833650
8605979444
5605865474
1101112623
6444262944
2328818123
1979776919
4429658994
2309278699
1800550993
6242166623
9529656613
3672863377
1860550108
6471310144
0642999002
0474560600
6872003774
8672893461
6840880638
3871829654
4811708846
7861440165
7883732019
7364381772
9874777757
7881778877
8861411688
3791373331
4311643141
6090000906
2256112562
8828836288
8232338282
2837478902
0924498182
6288538968
9643006962
7007876208
5897174149
3948595429
4580084164
1453694109
0974574509
5541552545
1887887127
5269695062
2332225374
9182518011
2129179828
8024520164
2187568016
8408550058
9027199097
2184884288
2289776728
8822788872
8037558157
0096352246
3328072296
8384051246
9759153197
9232878243
4541441504
2878282472
2625772756
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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