the mystery of cicada 3301

FOR YEARS, THE WORLD’S BEST CODE-BREAKERS HAVE OBSESSED OVER A SERIES OF CRYPTIC, NEAR-UNSOLVABLE PUZZLES. BUT WHO’S BEHIND IT ALL, AND WHAT DO THEY WANT?

Writer Kit Charming

ON JANUARY 5, 2012, USERS ON 4CHAN’S /X/ BOARD WERE GREETED WITH A STRANGE AND ANONYMOUS JPEG MESSAGE. THIS IS WHAT IT SAID: Hello. We are looking for highly intelligent individuals. To find them, we have devised a test. There is a message hidden in this image. Find it, and it will lead you on the road to finding us. We look forward to meeting the few that will make it all the way through. Good luck. 3301 That was it. There was no obvious clue as to the authors’ identities, the purpose of the message or what these “highly intelligent individuals” would be doing. Intrigued, a few canny users opened the JPEG as a text file, revealing a string of letters and numbers: TIBERIVS CLAUDIVS CAESAR says “lxxt>33m2mqkyv2gsq3q = w] O2ntk. Gibberish to most, but a…

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Smith Journal (Digital) - 1 Issue, Summer 2019

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