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:
3434632869
9630570865
2368594815
2662340747
8960999069
3004443043
5312632562
2468382324
4634539446
3736813584
0072909541
8019626453
8012342332
6512515251
8099998699
3776067770
0035880003
5015333011
9698976679
9666826698
9777794797
9393390938
1335891978
8307346999
7100491979
7694720697
2728171707
4631536096
1183395398
4885588524
1273509245
2183331632
1671511761
8233828238
7285772782
4525222522
9820575862
5311618741
6051985878
9026564683
2634736776
5826565862
9851998959
6380668366
9021009293
2412441402
8346464438
1343463461
8992312693
7129011461
0736062233
4155514499
3169653671
6281042479
3988783888
7773933737
8911519551
0126515513
7925762386
7191991761
3693909658
0385776020
3683921658
8201235025
7621216910
2193996190
8122906759
8229392822
9308898300
8681228281
2496922949
7102202279
1357421891
3357479507
1687922336
6581946538
6656996696
1717271217
3389433383
0212222142
1551999551
5118451111
1465345556
8012999803
3756111751
1686965376
3112444376
1416231614
1712419976
5178133262
4124838410
8888818888
8893993038
1939171903
4259298708
3974218918
8016933702
0717968088
8275438008
6213775225
5173620981
9260367646
6234328997
5985775555
6116313311
1233328331
9164669941
6978667969
0015751051
4526764226
3728558773
8476974498
3019984511
4416568667
0026864238
4726768804
8429779930
7436766673
9838779987
3579333554
1688515888
3475722526
9876780240
1488307983
3688876089
3735787306
The puzzle
Given the above hint, what famous landmark do the numbers below refer to?
2218013401
8718443987
8591413682
3165273403
6777773667
1155115481
3116213482
7262766732
3893848903
2124068258
1072569846
1726963107
2937211667
6199119968
3109393162
8846768647
1022221806
7199769217
4824458414
0094948390
8058080059
0730575053
1663878490
7697341113
0319478559
2894141023
8422945094
8975666657
8635757397
3970557333
8511515855
3910586459
4231547415
4975658851
8240487355
8247562394
3463343634
2488684622
6074363773
8221111188
6441147676
7088190054
7268685594
6463156654
8460682598
0010005016
6222222625
4447770434
7743595374
9036895635
4498406624
7072478654
3087325620
1773305634
0037030307
1146418446
0370307932
8772777027
3662870007
8173110416
0603050016
0744500427
5914047406
2537880087
0914214081
4619014031
6098810683
3644114633
5778282087
1076111067
7737710731
4486164481
0168571800
8878295231
0738061623
8135786642
8861717877
3225552225
0437040340
2738288337
8108787131
3255966530
3673689690
1997611162
3277389354
3693993399
6755664666
9275622565
8597339978
1249019411
1026815883
9944655263
2094338783
2418835475
7637535765
8368484763
4244445482
2838558283
7933523875
5831073053
2774124855
5728314150
7751874863
5015515055
0506524065
2013102141
7118313817
2177373123
9569069251
1539214027
2771750130
2166741190
5666756666
1158058105
9732228797
0078778000
2519552152
4756593445
1569490343
8351690595
3269498773
4577996575
4330300443
2239257293
4489789744
0983198310
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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