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:
7263949125
0793022595
7680949505
9269815425
8589112825
9922023903
2558445528
2115222195
9759589475
2988979111
2201251474
6988722939
3988782586
2958955392
2201121111
2578676255
6984778679
3582683362
2959964055
2258570277
5879850984
5459349326
9978199197
5959999959
2285858228
2472326322
7859597555
4243843343
6108888811
8915219198
1992919995
0008966499
8993843892
3192245235
4105890955
0995886630
1037207071
7761777675
9496196699
7191171119
9491160648
1495162823
1491218768
9416104161
7095209179
3167262672
2804800200
0905330050
1932934119
2932387745
0336813969
3907806678
0804360150
2967966522
8512682282
9770390909
2762266727
0345999049
9540728221
4742957968
4547624631
8717164080
4770711545
1556515627
0206696800
2522229552
4014991140
6542216140
6277696952
3761296620
8786415807
3094696442
1150805386
5128197326
9623446270
5986498377
0811515080
6660207226
4803048307
2522721977
3996396736
0836119276
5873887156
5432318001
7773305845
7373333333
6824766488
1716887777
0432838030
5358155856
6766958402
3709197512
2658853260
9789898583
1181998413
9352593520
7275527567
2209998202
8645658186
4488156626
8469053023
8494182274
1429302988
4468334666
5489085598
8920190990
8497148427
1089110889
7895721085
3694091536
9005423140
5795940899
6091516150
3885783378
7815977787
9600490974
5744154444
1371118357
9099000982
9924242958
8926590685
6132898657
3796890984
4061104957
1924648798
8193300557
The puzzle
Given the above hint, what famous landmark do the numbers below refer to?
1257779063
6396684430
1300646974
4097763005
1306716610
8358088880
5099705279
4137741131
6300660063
6314464344
7060696807
4004040420
1711371315
9607096420
6688876808
0292274227
0765474328
4222600327
5327003030
8149749948
7542455454
9562199626
7509722441
7142758472
8462766272
9503718952
5547714464
9193590519
6489630519
5484804654
1747416258
4224992654
2266116928
4514434519
1941404391
9460990244
3836118814
0000600000
2228929292
1405777715
1820965686
0236931613
2426251424
2236695015
2440189268
7014570415
1208606868
2509850090
4843338443
4217568397
2208429704
4543385351
2804981322
1418318292
7141132651
6477422005
4917189755
4767142876
4572754755
4930194919
2461826642
7191411164
6747040776
9565331956
0939301930
6666818666
8978379378
4831031975
7641808935
9190837960
3003837355
1920339663
8388238246
3738879833
1460060801
8868578650
4941239203
5963062801
1255470243
1368478743
7065239851
9802004530
4375481398
4631454094
9367852998
0509352390
5338881532
8985824986
6166671668
4444202494
9414959481
7412156205
2904433013
4734760156
4708110807
6414946044
2032423232
9419694999
7913791377
5830437078
9134353262
9174222234
6136368217
4894394488
6390223326
5136212265
8676566763
9138298828
4143161341
9969969947
2112624168
5393333399
7195634367
8575523378
9925533178
0607461308
9798261349
7154584877
5174585393
2134554118
0473301166
0374372073
0192550991
5054555555
2485888484
5133533133
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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