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:
8979494809
0829229822
1956090065
9323539923
1973504540
9309462479
8979287372
3327489709
1903225930
3214976647
9862691141
4104793667
6487678468
6667196361
5122128157
6448121468
8884493848
6426472642
8769521848
8861611078
9530441623
6926611548
1466116644
8042841028
8733369743
2702722570
1399391137
2867820124
8506807750
2839802974
5623612175
0200912059
1171111174
9122202924
7227227772
0585000845
0272447042
5038222350
8767007775
5162516161
5738348999
5162331549
0922039574
5762842291
8922284765
2507662677
5741757574
4738778744
0677177637
0538160694
6107132537
2578402482
0700478407
5537183820
1117597811
0010610181
8067491173
8061583763
4170914991
7011614771
1017557071
8008555500
0068444040
6660006966
0446444906
5957758752
6906991906
9503098906
1059808950
0080576756
5806206450
2292496902
7837576985
0429370085
7267472575
2470674129
4115114585
3701270125
5997776579
5569517965
2231192123
0846497406
3862196436
7299472102
2415092505
9919139190
2111137122
5243492435
3052532506
4754656455
2189992881
2216412064
8572265982
9433994310
9142811862
9754191082
5283511381
2622012961
4911314160
8853655132
8453658729
6432163781
0422125950
0493191249
8952626692
8428121888
4753634377
7833003387
5923962950
2483666215
2480188314
1923925041
9123192913
1910559859
5936169699
2483636886
1420941424
9371324339
0311729991
6383620231
3650296257
3973996237
9803089300
9992529659
5077790997
5256522651
The puzzle
Given the above hint, what famous landmark do the numbers below refer to?
9053232232
9036762397
2962592525
1919779111
9012508563
9962704915
2016786705
4946793575
4956400961
6647704376
5400055410
7748449798
5959558399
4392255480
4541745388
9427546193
1670755110
9505109788
0008200820
1303031209
9362953992
9229774924
5319230924
2569803992
4431304992
5717654290
6291020900
2220006227
9799151979
4959945991
5299995629
7930294973
9226776313
1735041819
3306995973
0688696917
8142192853
5651574037
7177595841
7200072897
5477174641
3379392837
5069885096
2885162851
7879478194
6849788988
7151313171
2988799929
2667772676
7959347278
2142776735
4452764183
1841394566
6668740629
6635552356
1162631652
4865545968
0643334264
7291855256
0537844954
5759731955
8126941996
1265634794
7720922202
0409000900
5825783272
5873578755
7875561424
5873563210
5820014840
5473092164
7801500169
7747488446
6824521298
6602478032
3304502984
3724734274
7907497727
9302101233
7844584577
6125451626
2727797217
0474007404
4299042902
9654994549
8733097218
7737198517
2917697504
9149748400
3424394402
4912604880
2437859730
0962078819
9429857700
9858554880
4898849858
6688008786
3073273200
1371757139
0653602316
5454366226
7658261606
8322070306
6602770226
1213382310
2721006720
6966569659
0077780707
4347223373
5879353993
0677222807
5035555335
0279507871
2277568618
4837137056
0629236081
2873340417
6181018808
8803680863
0874270184
4478117181
6181182871
8484289774
0488110355
4471246574
4501128418
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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