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:
3444353534
3332632637
2221881232
2332339122
6569812598
7324412528
4301059234
0614059538
0034639994
9955851953
4259002023
0314504918
1966672123
6070377036
5552552158
7119181711
8938989993
2332903923
1470307414
6056996099
5081180508
3117931139
5591326375
8191189003
5056987117
3020364819
3170959533
6153995645
0150950284
0468926955
5177968634
5674376766
4558949895
6187077180
0460506000
9175911174
6154674516
6363326233
8892995984
9111313918
4939276986
5061816930
4027176933
5842123233
7292598914
5496383280
5941541473
1786509368
8983922220
8443558384
1781371711
5916991159
2766772626
9123890338
7328955062
2353975379
7106741685
5158901143
7105955057
5975454459
5453737734
2126441124
9368060349
2862822386
6396860489
4631431634
8398391883
6950671634
4235921683
9223971384
2090471184
9350022674
2430519560
3052601165
5690604968
5644019901
5553513511
9200604968
0000001700
6961119165
1050051100
6330418020
5872919566
9247911896
0356411042
9594919549
8616218862
8228822080
2592029906
2212221326
5337273555
0716333636
4704577070
2366772793
2367769294
0314753754
0766796673
2309248963
6736329516
8459225718
5302536838
3459845760
5909585423
8457114584
8609550069
2909590900
3302220290
5429899945
0470307714
7362577665
2196216912
4288777727
4488528184
2398256231
0380526060
2416293338
7279289760
4009010737
0180361266
8253608237
2434618222
9339998932
6261661227
9278839228
0063300366
1579719757
The puzzle
Given the above hint, what famous landmark do the numbers below refer to?
8807080790
2335382345
4149404217
2023532506
4181432593
4128702706
0268100316
9090187760
0853384506
5187406189
5357200732
3120882862
5176505005
0187518710
6520225562
1156444149
5138433381
3378388733
8885757488
6660269280
8775187108
1477737471
7009237488
8084257008
9768385018
6439767601
2096787282
5405593953
4103729537
9477765682
4105341318
7349333343
9371737391
4107470004
1863511576
4405544544
1133393131
6696935699
9579497394
8535558354
4422253390
4990028639
4801185191
1863833364
9733795390
2292358216
3114459176
4234318264
7508415286
8810112218
5868865186
9196690166
1111119716
8885558278
9137371439
9079720789
5115885319
3373334067
5252670007
8935538467
3807021408
7283834709
4311521438
4528054404
5322057022
6201110262
7527115277
6227129980
2521130329
4327180895
6221457035
9522037563
2275373977
6576730386
4466473163
8216324921
6276573766
0465405500
4577377577
1616766167
8456254288
6844115021
2180681039
0947192589
6149327432
6865118186
2984324292
6147976199
0149396999
1220002102
1411111457
0788886078
4494674196
7741111756
8029878056
0181378858
3048481796
5903214959
5296871057
9138008396
5556557566
4444494453
6697776986
6768094956
9070576956
8851098958
9977508993
0626794866
3762473346
4767575777
0556550856
9467336947
1462547948
4702893031
4766560784
0702371187
9567114446
8149911848
3967969369
3552882255
7111551555
4153989615
3749584756
4981289363
7119925582
8143237856
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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