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:
8617760903
8858974204
0634963504
8448926310
6553933323
5633733673
9448989944
9817019910
8034888308
9197242879
0811876108
6067005367
2216117662
6588235628
1109072108
1243246379
5432342312
7437106662
4227225304
4948948119
9800707198
6333936339
9193437194
1113207104
4698235020
6486945328
1163535114
7989798975
1059039108
5959262959
4444994946
9506099945
3169138189
2650438947
0703699989
5769094989
7795542519
5490931385
5325819033
5753949792
1390551090
7852685855
8743834847
5998497595
5525992595
8598016131
9299334838
2234215978
2044816274
7327332271
2777114721
6848836838
3243344325
3515545134
4706545774
7142252111
1857535144
7862430111
5444353244
3333533153
1551185175
1166660116
1104142171
7278294902
9097336022
6197978943
9984836209
7477774979
8383938293
6620066002
3836383963
4318298142
3587855738
3266313656
1171151729
6666711766
4502611759
3537351636
0556411863
3470904839
7025954503
7717791767
1808108143
2220721347
0760992706
8003858147
0403792303
9633598767
0963091367
9922221702
1133405559
1557347652
8480207119
1490437659
3099337059
0246666402
9119949152
0555559559
6676607612
7451838365
8776931195
5395001387
3303639795
8878718787
3110531905
0013002361
0249022090
5567979655
0947526362
3717808086
0767598117
0217162798
0749177099
3537553753
4714881148
4567175455
8227182028
2649424249
1678228798
6175076607
3285558535
2075506450
3659287795
6048493282
6634034067
2245903017
The puzzle
Given the above hint, what famous landmark do the numbers below refer to?
3770177077
3390737333
8308130188
2046997922
3746983757
3580010439
8778194932
3000108513
2373172476
5603652465
5140492089
5470631986
5049102794
0070770700
4440600664
5959159591
5108667861
5403433554
5151535181
5777637658
4552284625
5463374643
2945274125
4610235625
9729977684
1184787658
6249677151
6518618865
3481888333
5216161511
2672979712
7611140631
5512926776
7611008752
2686822360
3475960135
4121142741
7437141537
4647477646
5055516555
6470218561
4817272756
5887419555
9882512731
9775641545
9975475985
1737705228
5420222428
7754495135
2222797228
0110301235
5457272435
0909905983
7075575158
5823570523
6668563258
7857785767
3333738337
5870435531
9186035353
1057265508
0524553357
9255135361
5201110426
0109826546
9165813492
1573416466
9321312893
1116413546
2212676212
3266323466
9756470469
1970322856
4894227133
3970651157
6060307039
4814914816
1070888001
6864164866
7994334494
3526632225
9697959667
5798789257
7012167210
2215958239
0867259617
7653189238
3935387258
3313684659
1642785538
3290549824
6457788817
3021756819
9489690329
9959599225
9669686319
0534550317
6888608614
8866673868
9974997979
6479889866
0578555075
6284774476
0984762007
0485834836
6454592811
6484974133
6979559315
8998994938
6766696606
8854885489
2253356392
5145456889
8268584609
6399955606
1077015476
7540794939
9074127110
7205141465
7255333556
4258340155
4204333044
7274124272
9230409935
8605888660
9058455995
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.
Post a comment