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:
3217523111
3857883887
9380191119
2425752267
2200781080
2325341055
2477127805
2205151522
2355158483
4088042800
3330603946
1545551764
9795170189
1738870184
9801590189
6633590185
6927672105
1564372870
4688368343
3138138113
0446442688
3737330637
5129432637
8319880231
3074430343
8159132667
0457138247
4348858349
7721617662
2770103713
8599799587
4124857737
5065893562
7078108512
7613418882
5881548082
8508885808
6716767776
0664008604
9893935894
3008635876
9507835608
5947408806
4116265825
2429635706
6797225967
2832222326
2325236225
5373573445
4847835946
2358026836
1334873966
6081883996
2334722825
0225020532
2714214774
2224772227
6967196667
6935166420
6913005701
6225700352
2219002740
3965189597
0500007055
9629292862
5242584525
7341116447
9848094825
0463892720
8503214565
2018442427
4865280465
9826969162
8379555889
2831883382
0047575000
2829302114
2847578840
3331964286
1047927083
8546531557
6156161566
4419595457
8753858379
2848554248
8378051458
2916491257
6729664359
0922561268
6827659446
1446458416
2962922997
5564667546
7952779552
0014459716
1516673026
1651923552
5041702746
4729377447
0286137281
1983267957
5445365750
9787635976
3833553980
5132267251
3666336931
7377753777
5085505856
2823259332
5111525314
9999999599
1195119451
6012899454
5303719416
9482559394
3469929112
1454429354
0426201934
1933298901
1132278996
0123785050
6112712211
2996222922
1923522191
0162216617
1436014143
The puzzle
Given the above hint, what famous landmark do the numbers below refer to?
9807630876
2669286269
6861168115
8448118340
6747232170
3087788110
3955438279
6434508145
0401480118
8220424220
0215820055
9549055991
5359953995
0245960293
0545051302
9359037553
3559678982
0520690441
6225349214
6319503864
8383039330
6211369826
8614338188
6269096069
1221929291
1303559131
8385385338
7951627974
4809120554
1788020680
7557230656
5505530956
8266828660
6510030556
0333337503
7964797684
3913335391
9933838981
1061672164
9474194617
4821694391
3835477981
8084815383
0510174181
5830535927
1000021080
5665111165
2600200502
1551718574
9659211572
1484081174
1930623065
9318300004
7091340585
4661861612
4343833843
9961868899
3184313433
9394585224
0363855110
4983366560
4143593544
6981886525
5095008592
3737913779
3344553824
8281771538
5394453532
8224013722
2100380728
7526713532
3022280523
5881881884
1144741414
4589884485
4002999920
1189781210
1899995743
4102942382
4189874348
5801941787
0794814221
7189004298
5684680278
3217014226
0122110221
3137607634
0472604276
0949404449
8855885828
0477593646
0773498597
9288904996
4752854546
3117973931
2432202643
4343334646
5689998693
4422554572
5780104779
8877913773
7322393779
9310413674
5451514559
0777710774
9909797790
1399913979
6938803688
4788888788
8973993899
9973493445
8922119228
4903121342
9403850458
4982988149
9418917160
8973956144
2247045270
9076997506
7577128671
9888998998
5262897998
0011299670
3412097691
7706449670
9419845631
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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