A challenge for JThorson?

[Cathunter]

Jeff, you solve it & I think a few of us would be willing to pitch in for your airfare.
http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?pf=&guid=98d386cb-1ec5-4703-93ef-db82be17acc4&decrypt=y&log=y

[This message has been edited by Cathunter (edited 02-06-2005).]

[brkster]

Wow! This one’s even more of an enigma than Enigma.

[Mama Fishcacher]

I’m surprised nobody has found it yet! They must need some Wisconsin cachers out there to figure it out.

[Folk Trakers]

I’ve been watching this one (and trying to solve it) since it came out!

This makes my Enigma look like childs play…but it definately gets me thinking….hmmmmm.

[Linus4Cache]

quote:

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Originally posted by Folk Trakers:
I’ve been watching this one (and trying to solve it) since it came out!

This makes my Enigma look like childs play…but it definately gets me thinking….hmmmmm.

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Okay, so Bill is having touble w/ it, and Jeff hasn’t even replied. Can I just say that I’m a little afraid now? LOL! Good luck to all who attempt this one!
~Major Brat

[jthorson]

quote:

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Originally posted by Linus4Cache:
Okay, so Bill is having touble w/ it, and Jeff hasn’t even replied.

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-blush-

Sorry, I was in New York yesterday and didn’t see this thread. No, ummm no, I have no idea the meaning of the message.

[jthorson]

Curse you CatHunter

I had plans for last night and this got in the way. The whole thing is the key phrase. I used the cachemaster’s son’s name (how cliche) etc. but nothing popped up. Below is a snapshot of the spreadsheet I built.

I’m going to bed.

[Jeremy]

Why did someone post this? Just to torture people?

I also spent way too much time on this one last night (when I should have been working on school work!). I’ve got a Python script that allows me to do the same thing as Jeff’s spreadsheet. Someone has posted a tool on web that will let people try different keys… go here.

I also went through the trouble of trying to figure out the key via a technique known as the Friedman Test (or Friedman Attack). (See this presentation… I’ve got a textbook that explains it better.) My index of coincidence analysis showed (though not conclusively) that the key is 13 characters long. You should be able to determine the actual key characters using the Friedman Test as well, but this seemed to break down… probably not enough text, or not enough like “English prose”.

Note that “saranaclakeny” is 13 characters long but is not the key…

Maybe it is time to just “brute force” this one. If the first thing in the message is an English word (and better yet, if the key is an English word), I’m guessing my blazin’ fast 64-bit processor can find what the start of the key is in less than a day…

[Jeremy]

OK, I’m just about to give up on this one. For those of you trying to attack this one manually, with some sort of “alphanumeric wheel” or spreadsheet, I can tell you this:

[*] The key is not a single english word or proper name (I tried 250,000 of them)
[*] The key is not any word in the “letter”, nor any combination of 2 or 3 these words in the order they are listed in the “letter”

Assumption now is that the key is a nonsensical word or an extremely long combination of words (or the original cacher didn’t encode the message correctly or is pulling our legs ).

I’m now just throwing things at it, assuming the words “north”, “west”, or “cache” will appear somewhere in the message. We’ll see if I get any hits on this… it will probably take overnight.

[Flushingrouse]

This is so far beyond me, it’s not even funny… I believe we have some of the best people working on it…

I offically declare that I’ll put up $25.00 towards a plane ticket if we can have a Wisconsin cacher solve and find this cache…!!!

Any more takers? Wouldn’t take much and we’d have a ticket or two in no time!!

~Bill

[brkster]

Any chance the code is a decoy, and the answer lies somewhere in the letter itself???

[LightningBugs Mum]

quote:

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Originally posted by Flushingrouse:
I offically declare that I’ll put up $25.00 towards a plane ticket if we can have a Wisconsin cacher solve and find this cache…!!!

Any more takers? Wouldn’t take much and we’d have a ticket or two in no time!!

~Bill

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I’m in. I’d love to have one of us go out to grab that one. Won’t be me, tho….

[Miata]

Crack it and I’m in for $25 too.

[Mama Fishcacher]

quote:

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Originally posted by Flushingrouse:
This is so far beyond me, it’s not even funny… I believe we have some of the best people working on it…

I offically declare that I’ll put up $25.00 towards a plane ticket if we can have a Wisconsin cacher solve and find this cache…!!!

Any more takers? Wouldn’t take much and we’d have a ticket or two in no time!!

~Bill

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Great idea! You can add me to the list of $25.00 contributors!

~Mama Fishcacher

[Mama Fishcacher]

quote:

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Originally posted by jvechinski:
OK, I’m just about to give up on this one. For those of you trying to attack this one manually, with some sort of “alphanumeric wheel” or spreadsheet, I can tell you this:

[*] The key is not a single english word or proper name (I tried 250,000 of them)
[*] The key is not any word in the “letter”, nor any combination of 2 or 3 these words in the order they are listed in the “letter”

Assumption now is that the key is a nonsensical word or an extremely long combination of words (or the original cacher didn’t encode the message correctly or is pulling our legs ).

I’m now just throwing things at it, assuming the words “north”, “west”, or “cache” will appear somewhere in the message. We’ll see if I get any hits on this… it will probably take overnight.

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Holy cow!! I’m impressed! I’m glad there are folks like you in the world! (Because I’m not one of them!! LOL!)

I was puttering around on it a little bit the other night and learning all about cryptology from google…. Little Fishcacher (a 2nd grader) brought me an elementary school book today about writing and decoding secret codes and said maybe it would help me! Hee hee!

I’ve been thinking that maybe some of the words in quotation marks have more meaning from the letter? But I also wondered if it was an every 3rd letter type thing also…. And what if the whole thing is written in mirror type so you can’t read it unless you hold it to a mirror? Then the key might not make any sense at all… My brain hurts with all the considerations!!! (And I DID figure out Enigma too…. Now to just get down there….) I like puzzles I can figure out. The ones that I can’t just piss me off, lolol.

~MF

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