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:
3789652098
6626560153
0080853332
7969690353
9358552398
5255653652
9399696193
5834369358
5703350037
5108010001
6453333464
9983838888
6583996085
5788904747
9743900208
6443010977
6713970409
0708324446
7530325351
4116119359
0283516361
7924010881
6993919061
6518106815
3991915319
0686626086
0755750357
6495770838
0784850815
4718027132
4416250842
5445559415
7577857178
8010120182
8383363832
3437653645
5339426243
2443656373
3917716352
3219456073
4636936974
5672756372
6606306343
2938449284
5252224053
8751555187
9152495234
0650110066
2566552252
1562747159
0550565341
0761178540
2268189632
8761508232
4969396644
8701177071
3144314433
3334535535
3909583740
5341917071
3901164492
3744047770
3764929234
2165151261
1973494431
8867686868
6942333625
8842327860
6964342690
9127137843
9862337921
9867324333
4777774473
0001400141
5556296452
9994979933
8546834952
4250975945
5828990439
4157896941
0182934443
0746344081
0221032037
0611495128
4241562983
0512510521
7743447774
0626162526
4231323113
7648008400
6698888639
7685776285
4355554865
9891198196
9945658895
4127808215
3142992289
7476708856
2000004159
4599004909
4578077454
7208700778
2577331277
2599389772
2229737037
4579977823
4598722029
2828748967
0170853336
7170499966
0773886376
5771524136
5590159909
0773875077
9578885978
7732553257
7141471741
4550190751
6560754107
7656014652
6189788278
7268117778
6556165565
2505550505
0150775075
4689006997
The puzzle
Given the above hint, what famous landmark do the numbers below refer to?
0888988901
2679029460
5535565053
6779597566
0856417557
5800425536
1496218507
0713498563
7206317503
8888288260
1141414367
3464496443
9280990828
1156690223
4722182247
9626525353
5384725858
0191725447
0646960566
6760868767
0346166304
9884399994
2846382373
6686310532
9746451236
6747387947
9666145479
2877272878
9557589574
5456656421
6361992361
1949292773
8845099891
6126799871
0245256360
0727586361
0040472686
0140133315
9143106558
0618140160
4620550556
0147311371
9046400446
7132121717
0818518516
6840363643
3567445648
2049942902
0623336036
0547348820
6540619597
4667354644
3540640400
2549440620
8858508558
9196636196
2066557069
7514515745
1718676062
5722403442
3852711042
4522256195
5516605446
2220795333
3133952350
3724782190
3130186680
2163711676
3226662666
2193923199
6930500957
3720103032
6519815446
6547625191
6705608237
1528526943
0328990352
1509695690
1643555411
3587223357
6515858116
8321034801
3891175856
8820176816
3228234932
6869336812
8808866808
5595474905
0001330031
6088550856
5833213907
5433625122
5846250043
0615322836
1111318331
5895292289
0823088832
5430750057
2636626662
3334564835
2743743723
5175728575
1003550133
7529858171
7239763671
2887053714
9700428121
6863152513
2988828289
7677767747
7727467407
1716131976
0269638989
1400108407
2438821407
4609621589
9212867789
7191871692
8458802451
6142493712
7791128168
7451114777
6198888618
7341871233
1742874112
3147433177
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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