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:
5191588954
8208574955
0370383950
8475271453
3939933987
8464484494
9559888954
3354561453
0777575830
3689752246
4486085440
2283766993
7476782833
3267737272
2679099292
7453673255
7286078728
7846787778
3067503775
3407249334
5936896955
1458111111
5456183904
1936256570
1908958395
3437425140
7007103033
3582468749
7904278258
8049665652
2546501603
7034533377
3986668686
3579773397
2041410472
8132282122
9835054466
0428586471
9861039519
9671327463
8401518051
8831313878
9678888979
0675057065
2825885822
2782354586
2781340336
2782328836
2729566822
9022772277
2782575878
4779374737
2881982838
4910304493
1865036370
6782739087
5815325810
5814326512
0842338435
1711771111
5884758887
4218314232
6355055555
0339529929
1300946407
9380511956
0179964916
6430990463
0372973902
1406660416
9189991941
3970573759
4403198180
0612269082
0919703562
6977923451
6489776646
7662266276
4977999994
0613110061
8412148416
0014621015
7281223695
2628435895
3240493239
0300330094
2056220615
0089990809
0353333235
0801001805
5550305352
1491010154
2230220037
3474337406
2205414055
2810736156
3348824952
7313015452
6181917054
8364948469
4796179113
1694229249
7896378999
1793385313
7604336407
8696119540
1894390748
7396385157
7820388738
9798009988
6280008600
7696336717
7891308659
6650867299
9680020131
7250392934
0281353833
0932931249
1203234748
8670331631
3543091648
2009794702
9144141938
0761131601
6264797246
3340430204
The puzzle
Given the above hint, what famous landmark do the numbers below refer to?
6487340995
7502474053
5095009153
2665679999
3333313393
0910220198
7795779059
8855525958
6246644635
7120079569
1920678987
8321527955
1822149710
7905999507
7829122989
1191591591
1392010282
8120686862
9798563952
7817604929
7097709729
7343259910
2852553782
0029204920
4449949949
7666161135
4441428414
9092909592
2303333207
1831188313
8383333383
3379039383
9050833537
0751003303
0978838383
5963033593
3995972359
8886262698
2088022086
5661191366
2901652088
8520822698
9051371096
8451522326
7296555089
1727441172
2598759955
3235952328
0517337100
1817788909
6519666984
1519330391
4817744698
4827931522
9052629099
0181688511
2214922424
5870959758
9180968272
6470933574
3871972115
0214969361
5071975607
0004929094
4944646967
1391133119
1851516551
8745616921
1320116514
5082889584
5211183017
7092686016
4221262074
2120107960
6254190752
6231548864
0342114061
0453830838
6224566642
4731881418
2170221117
4148148418
1588565308
2422240622
7771777710
1830070418
9595887420
1355777816
8627165128
4595060618
4119889641
2718176821
5493637694
6353535566
4591434226
6557564564
0982047641
3365964264
3344135541
5446146651
1693090694
3487994479
6559995595
3645101036
5463007658
5497910849
6496003704
1646813114
7427073083
1828997467
2457761484
2427942533
7422772747
2179412929
7857666768
2957977475
1438228188
5161155168
4439306439
9799990391
3414931149
6508035169
5057105361
6029896149
4314996738
4480905721
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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