![]() ![]() However, Cicada was much more than a game. One of the people that knows this more than anyone is Nox Populi, one of the alleged winners of the Second Puzzle. It started as an online campaign and eventually crossed over to the real world. To be honest, who could blame them? Cicada did seem like an ARG at face value. This was also a pretty big ARG about AI murders (Rowe 2017). These are normally done by big companies to promote movies or video games, such as Microsoft’s ARG back in 2001 to promote the movie A.I. Many people likened Cicada to an ARG, or alternate reality game. Now, as much as I’d like to get into the Second Puzzle and the ongoing Third Puzzle, my essay has almost reached the word limit.Ĭicada was a revolutionary event in cryptography due to its complexity and its crossover into the physical world. According to David Wångstedt, the site closed down with the message: “We want the best, not the followers” (Wångstedt 2018). The first 20 or so people to scan these QR codes and access the webpage associated with it were accepted. Once the countdown reached 0, the page changed to display a list of coordinates, along with the text: “Find our symbol at the location nearest you.” At those specific coordinates, people found sheets of paper with QR codes on them taped to various things, like poles and bus stations. com) users were taken to a page with a countdown next to a picture of a cicada. Using this number as a web address(845145127. These numbers multiplied by 3301 led to 845145127. After some more digging, it was discovered that the two other prime numbers the message informed them about were 509 and 503, the dimensions of the image. The users would have to multiply all three of said numbers and use the product as a web address. The message congratulated the ones to make it to this step, and told them that there were three prime numbers associated with the first image posted. As David Wångstedt put it in his video “Cicada 3301: an Internet Mystery,” “The code was used to uncover a phone number hidden within the book, that played a prerecorded message” (Wångstedt 2018). The image contained a message, and the message led to a book, accompanied by a code. Once the posts were decoded, they contained an image. This image looked like it was a dead end, but users noticed that by using a program known as OutGuess and plugging in the image, users would get a message that took them to a Reddit forum entirely in code. Looks like you can’t guess how to get the image out” (Wångstedt 2018). Once decrypted, users were taken to an image of a decoy duck, with the message next to it: “Woops, just decoys this way. ![]() Soon after it was posted, someone found that by opening the image with a text editor, there was a string of readable text found: “TIBERIVS CLAVDIVS CAESAR says,” and followed it with a link encrypted with the Caesar cipher, as shown by the introduction. It encouraged 4channers to find a message that the original poster hid in the image. This was a great puzzle and it was the future of cryptography and steganography, due to its complexity and appearance in the real world.įor those who don’t know what Cicada 3301 was/is, it started as an image posted on 4chan’s /b/ board, or random board. I am, of course, talking about Cicada 3301. When you hear the word “puzzle,” what do you think of? Do you think of a jigsaw puzzle or things of the like? Or do you think of a Sphinx, giving people puzzles in order for them to pass through? I think of a scavenger hunt, led by someone leaving clues and giving the winners a prize. ![]()
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