The man making puzzles for hackers | Hacker News Reader

The man making puzzles for hackers

bbc.com

58 pointsjackgavigan13 comments

Somewhat related: Are there any puzzle subscription services out there? I think it'd be a really interesting business to receive an innovative, creative puzzle weekly or monthly that show some real effort and artistry. Maybe it would be a mix of physical and digital puzzles. Does that exist?

If not, I might have to do that :)

One such thing was http://blacklettergame.com/ which I guess is being re-run (with new content) periodically.

Also there's P&A Magazine (pronounced "Panda"): http://pandamagazine.com/

Here's a puzzle...

Decode me 3 times or 64:

WW0wNFoyTklTbkJsYlZWbldtMDVlVWxJYkhaa1V6UTk=

winner gets the prize written in the message.

:-)

No soup for me!

:( no prize for me

Got anything tougher?

watch my name, I'll throw something out there.

Here you are:

  Vm0wd2QyVkhVWGhUV0d4VFltdHdVRlp0ZUhkVU1WcDBaVWhrYWxKc1d
  ucFhhMk0xWVVaS2MxZHVhRmRTZWtFeFdWY3hTMUl4WkhOWGJGcFhUVE
  ZHTTFaclpEUlpWMUpJVm10V1UySklRbTlVVmxwM1ZWWmtWMVZyU214U
  01EVjVWR3hhVjFWdFNrbFJiVGxWVm14YU0xbHFSbHBsUm1SMFVteGtU
  bEpHV2paV2JUQXhWVEZSZUZkdVRsaGhlbXhoV1d0a2IxVXhjRmhsUjN
  SWVVsUldXVmt3V2tOV01rVjNZMFpTVjFaV2NGTmFSRVpEVld4Q1ZVMU
  VNRDA9

SCNR

given that by random chance the first decoding was 32-bytes, the same size as a bitcoin private key, the actual decoding was a bit of a let down :(

In case anyone is wondering about the odd font on the yellow press pass, it's actually a phonetic alphabet for English called Shavian. It was a project of George Bernard Shaw, who was a vigorous spelling reformist. It didn't get very far, but there was a book published in Shavian and a more useful spinoff called Quikscript. If you're interested in a rare or cryptic shorthand for note taking, either might be for you.

This sounds really cool. Anyone written about the previous puzzles?

Here's a pretty nuts write up from last year's winners: http://elegin.com/dc22/.

Same challenge, different team.

http://potatohatsecurity.tumblr.com/post/94565729529/defcon-...

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