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:
5132771342
9402892899
8555855555
8695995966
5175924622
5735172483
8432537706
8602863226
5572787069
0771407077
9890399989
5164014110
5269595752
0844545870
5190426871
5160016506
0170726334
8108582424
1738888782
5829258895
2764161214
8114334813
2867563853
5828131567
5867246241
1697300888
2837296659
7793601675
8011749853
9444606341
8913903590
7918718789
7703937793
8019680093
2144626466
9461969999
2279932929
7868788767
3963696318
1977917392
7537237712
2383287918
3297696968
7917520390
5157547912
2903397352
0433346033
0340435540
5997970951
6359870651
7022075921
3837980650
0948875031
3924592636
0400909403
4145116645
9537553073
0800338082
3967818802
6268758472
3096239445
0746088063
4240003825
4581114805
4808303487
6469606097
2867778266
5435036295
5906378067
3106106886
6661403454
0042306837
9467846847
2345553432
6637976676
2893938439
2347124361
2667541768
2337980404
9663805529
9338598085
2246363663
3585276616
0324776933
3966295465
4113113643
9699996336
6369673965
4579727519
4215425419
6457727708
9987679016
0839178787
8468678789
2972579257
6599568759
0288027008
8887188716
7774771787
8443461529
2151139845
7047630235
7050102212
2939133922
1093600091
2147427447
7051155651
8450250048
5074608410
0659370855
8679493835
7658305185
0658556665
1178414711
5644644444
3609330600
7052824750
3943839438
7305430545
3391433431
9260332923
3900342164
9965458216
3365861476
9460338849
3361607779
The puzzle
Given the above hint, what famous landmark do the numbers below refer to?
0537581317
1700580189
2903083680
9108635480
4118194681
0090710179
3313131435
8798393780
5516785317
8757087587
9964296999
9459794757
4106111141
4459764490
8154122824
4854070219
4116744459
9414734501
9167917117
0890980880
4811551514
8068118080
0937989002
6137184759
9910567585
0297599317
8060998409
8029673849
1856079922
6724973929
2391871811
9127179421
8139938949
1312303912
2227771822
8789771889
5981100974
2197676976
4127377474
3991832974
7774772574
9424939734
5966265932
4476676476
0006507056
3980293412
5685642864
2682622392
5902382684
2602336002
8980666809
7681677781
5629225220
3587636833
5817716386
1602786359
6118702036
1187766573
1872772171
5417747544
6188228288
5547454774
0688786658
3918434731
8005933302
9870135328
4003853706
7330353307
3776604736
3884803882
1616067301
1238230128
7461046410
2875557559
7694874686
1189591511
1867527174
5651527043
2184569251
7169065758
9885513785
0645554685
6506866866
8911289189
1636536316
8506509919
0505284751
1506284338
8612844218
1616241309
0440440444
1404510404
7688666687
0916190066
8418184666
7607524006
0688167154
0618531395
0600420514
8600252993
8220954443
2478670111
6630056923
2255550492
4999446943
6181838911
3176676133
2411154421
5551545145
2621231620
1667781766
3030336034
9089835035
0311031639
7968835740
8926546766
0292741123
8901473996
4420650577
3308052167
5870872996
9660750167
9039902923
1767112667
9997775937
9695993596
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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