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:
7497536425
0301736824
2507566205
4909259485
0646550426
4883836844
4392439284
3516565325
5377776573
7666037046
8244844289
3088308388
1911994481
5734437881
7340808489
6408607689
5840747481
6409134249
8449261531
0859253831
8452134995
1700301980
8759579959
6625363536
0440118401
1869292268
1902112221
4597749579
4533040235
4696996436
3356534519
7593839416
6447136530
9935493436
7874241270
4065890570
8119111911
9191799911
4405445445
6454333496
6491763450
9499398164
6404166857
6405145624
8701451413
6613116613
1857217152
6580368808
6429779667
6480108064
6619220287
6488296514
7627111534
6629503171
8640996806
2519719979
1921119891
2687111788
2648949361
2627993765
2588355082
8617625191
2989174245
1848954588
6811224350
1888795907
2628902353
8817777788
1437634334
2628922996
1941211413
6688006880
9613173743
1015613357
8755529063
8060507667
4643116444
1005555115
8065101486
9710670671
8774877487
0420222054
7422373282
3406767304
9111111192
9904892042
3222167302
6223823984
1072310354
6662670604
8421181249
6033000635
9686666280
8994339984
3874491234
1242151984
5610400289
8646599945
8874430384
0967192577
2910397102
8373098221
9783098177
9227552797
7887848178
2001217202
5135551571
9333899381
3676976813
6949363843
4880656577
4429437541
7732773821
3377733773
5455551547
5772077240
6666666673
2799927991
8285848582
8640654628
1511535451
0855859952
4023258951
1429032652
6047639991
4745928421
The puzzle
Given the above hint, what famous landmark do the numbers below refer to?
6666629664
1777136167
2467667022
3123311283
7152837123
9318116022
2061639532
6048262627
5997422234
0061798769
0033012213
0730709742
4761707798
4983798383
1738217214
0061006611
6161661161
0636232362
0554900405
9983989998
0257770205
2154334345
0153305993
9514962394
0657343920
2952977756
0927253559
8514818871
7349134777
8346444434
2242554252
8340547385
2316106620
7846568911
0542501489
1546545559
6787363788
7423134211
0652720726
0655350956
0453329770
0653352064
0423362208
0553046863
7353128973
2322523253
4227462470
8575800815
6556596465
7210052475
2364250473
2262963471
2844909852
0203903850
9938109943
5698198221
9768171137
9698149025
5268955585
9967167991
1694894976
9858195989
9735223223
1109001629
4121741472
4743437746
9695552599
5187051646
3718737662
8054468599
5113641466
9780667799
2540728320
1006977926
1061986635
3580322964
8581998758
1960330336
3046964360
1801511818
1805785050
7067810047
7067080811
7037166768
3444943073
9907970997
3041881489
7063177636
2437623726
3964116364
4408396092
5800304634
5803680994
3403383640
5403333330
3890383639
4404644444
8440747440
5046445544
2686795996
4896613530
5154335916
3350239590
7577593537
6556535596
9061019510
9717117997
0363633560
9569669656
6479554576
3875442373
1386336813
6409327165
3987325058
9979428212
3574420096
9889487797
2848778484
0087680677
5950757535
4408111410
5808705693
4830643445
0908635263
5448763781
4031142747
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.
Post a comment