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:
0480946377
7936548602
0635927035
0289949828
4436934364
0289558380
0620926296
7934030979
4586244642
1034043600
2217417542
4522225245
8482334822
9011014645
4528424281
1186947325
4160524382
6852855222
3172840732
6748801328
6078090267
2018184596
9022110214
0310000100
6157887786
3978007889
2441224441
6730227277
4149448114
8650405555
5169999191
5159984286
5669873098
5750585528
8659862246
5130849560
1488488888
2987020777
7200772720
6457114871
7487749787
4487403175
1980075841
6487524233
6427197523
5882425984
7000750747
6650060675
0222332602
1761652241
8107730777
9923366771
6476065642
5493200671
3181111119
5592999559
6407444077
2024772027
3127188434
8407938796
9124954040
6534929949
5837156923
9292015209
0555550155
3665635686
8548555882
3957255084
7009155159
2740635282
4507952386
2572752884
1782196618
7031502413
1131135132
8146546428
3171111751
7898779797
1040500050
8736373783
6882586225
0042442940
3453718437
2355962953
8610116880
5394818937
0591242930
6745868980
7748112983
0628901143
6503729148
6502770355
5212194098
9215728143
5519775715
6794777299
3252535525
9801119819
3115111151
7646164761
1118968910
1878711867
4949551954
7718218964
7086951757
3684014957
3714014167
7980364910
2665547446
1561564417
0161130818
5161143450
1530151531
2161626611
0565555555
5165551665
2663538553
7950131639
4916101446
9900316929
2905125435
5756355756
4915545111
4409191101
9910699190
2308032007
The puzzle
Given the above hint, what famous landmark do the numbers below refer to?
1169118149
0070097204
3808338013
7791175197
6704638117
1477075297
4248815113
9705777201
7805217207
6708974368
6480084325
6132480218
4546496234
8832994328
3679676367
2082285204
5807009875
8006580635
4187515141
3722137771
7984777777
5908332055
7728507208
6984549406
3987139901
7707323237
8127513640
5769669389
3262994402
4663966412
7087896362
8091198110
8482864882
0444044409
7066806298
6932397362
0645298295
1602980594
2543282295
2400090235
7777570795
0503550932
9434491494
9952992295
0805888503
2366339632
6768080876
8921983891
9966956669
2703659691
9539483676
1242830673
4109838696
5174533691
3797007007
9692828692
3494994993
7552375532
7490328553
3652967052
3654945759
3692393756
9652485452
3333151336
1811913995
7687778762
6101390316
3898870362
0455358716
3469518912
4863791395
6016521372
4229989344
1256168637
4256977591
5201949193
2206777427
1256161165
4101808101
5708580077
3269932962
9377954573
1715635715
7730755518
2896019588
8851515748
0000500570
3577754718
5544228545
9663369783
1002309376
9083241216
5754689016
4931252380
0308336080
8802282285
3675359376
9119331911
2004046220
1984894419
4290890492
6458544466
3579393993
4953505944
4370584378
7950338908
8399893282
8359818576
5265612651
4200962415
4159642450
2190412412
3101519510
4726466472
4445442455
6111222611
3805983059
9579997315
0956695806
7468487498
5594594595
8627097808
1798291598
9576197895
6447095413
6109481895
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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