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:
2236515575
5211068061
4514520065
4516564467
2518915291
2216992926
4631266642
5262565265
4516057144
3178318944
6474935922
3104381358
3000361963
6400994654
9271313917
2114344331
9110409141
3008113001
9324993640
2141320948
8109905479
6124925572
6764373733
7101311101
8377227224
9029992999
2124992992
5115415136
4766280239
4475607137
9957410289
2979775239
1684113186
4044400234
4669884296
1888867618
3038426512
0591600542
4353684509
6379523477
0399999309
6578767877
0241511121
4633666336
3955453914
0201400006
1929119119
5577657667
3652153321
5271123406
5829143363
1602175475
5971466492
0602184009
4645401666
9034605992
1027031003
2539835868
5606535066
3455533995
3300303118
0640447606
8118121813
0174775325
2003543351
6628290352
8681073352
3537775730
9044040346
1315535651
2422283422
3283090328
5370768398
8320980520
5450630291
6650301974
1310939302
6358333383
6270760270
5420606046
9677070760
0710717010
2822285582
3191331196
5551574516
6749475580
0689181510
2901774199
8031679140
2957875192
2285879446
1383799620
6296762411
4696562244
0273737777
2386822832
4882554838
3996139919
1685886116
7827554350
0668925952
5176814157
5646851157
5357510357
2588552168
2433254302
3244025904
9335591355
1239358192
0322464377
3826165364
6220455498
3877138177
2052555062
9004979480
9053355398
6554565544
9944669449
3399898730
2822382213
5456534855
5441494410
8549962853
1117498845
6259228049
4890962443
The puzzle
Given the above hint, what famous landmark do the numbers below refer to?
0274340743
9996676598
4594675649
1505155410
1577656743
8334675513
2278875649
0057255289
9655670449
6786969869
6770976769
9613861493
5124551515
6186983486
5112582444
5286572259
1580916741
6184401040
1170019355
9542286345
9918693755
3450693853
7375579355
1932112933
2647482746
8580993805
9833738276
0690660090
6481481864
1587775481
6970179797
1977963704
0580758282
1621654595
0297989430
0587435574
9187836705
2328573758
8033588364
5398637354
8839538958
6666626768
7408887704
3360533356
5590797705
0676037284
8677047425
8076270334
0747941793
9410719411
8677968873
0378008330
2037633326
6746464446
7341636141
4014310443
0862668646
5573997595
7512962323
2543913158
4513935531
5332346795
0842323930
5045945295
5025028059
7444714947
3022338902
9261654249
2011738900
4891214956
4168744056
9930535007
8034456140
9019013036
0759985803
7214941554
8519998198
9244744944
0574077777
0034433040
7150077006
2512552211
2590052960
0960996700
5959393495
3017212901
1455956700
3631412931
3511856495
8059657700
0008006850
4684004284
4844804853
2229191206
9544698856
7064105886
6364904854
5064404184
6779306153
6786000606
4402555222
7452227270
8427174847
6402107401
6422545092
0702593088
7982265076
8457155197
8934734814
8243795568
1374705078
1893786082
8433778038
3074003400
1845451444
1293422494
8986498866
0514597484
4482792045
7488776900
2382500391
2319732331
6682686628
4458554485
7522622556
6884777781
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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