What is Cicada 3301?
Cicada is basically a type of fly, we all know that. But, “Cicada 3301” is an online group of people with lots of mysteries and their agenda is not clear. They first came under the spotlight back in January 3rd, 2012 when they posted some puzzles to be solved by the people with higher intelligence who wants to work for them.
The First Step
There’s an image board website “4 chan”, most of us know about it. It has a board called random board which allows any and all images to be posted on it. Back in 3rd January, 2012, a mysterious image was posted on this board. The background of the image was white and something like “We are looking for highly intelligent individuals. To find them, we have devised a test. There is a message hidden in this image” was written on the image. If the image was viewed through a text editor, a cypher could be seen and the cypher would led to a decoy image. All these things seemed very strange and some assumed this to be a prank. But people like hackers and code breakers wanted to give it a shot to decipher it. The image was cryptically signed “3301”
Those who could decipher the code hidden in the image, was lead to a sub-reddit on the platform called reddit. From that sub-reddit, after cracking exclusively coded material, they were lead to a book named “The Mabiogion”. This book was a collection of early Celtic mythology and folklore.
The Next Step
Those who were able to crack some more codes from that book were lead to another message which says, “Very Good. You have done well. There are three prime numbers associated with the original final.jpg image. 3301 is one of them.” They were asked to find out other three numbers and multiply all 3 of them together. And then they should put a “.com” at the end of the result which will led them to a website.
Those who could crack the code and made it to the website, found a countdown clock which had an image of cicada. A list of 14 coordinates came in front once the clock hit zero. There was also a message, “Find our symbol at the location nearest you”. The 14 coordination’s locations were different locations of 5 different countries across the globe. In each location, there were posters with a scannable QR code.
This means the game was no longer just an online game, you have to come out of your house and find those locations to solve the puzzle. The QR code led to a website after solving few more puzzles. The website could only be accessed through the dark web. Only those who could made it to the website first were shown the message “We want the best, not the followers”. Finalists were warned “not to collaborate”
Some Facts about Cicada 3301
*** People around the globe tried to solve the puzzle and millions are still trying.
*** The original puzzle was the one from 2012, the two after that were considered hoax.
*** No one has ever claimed to have contact with Cicada 3301.
*** There was a mysterious book written called Liber Primus that explains what the characteristics of a Cicadian. A book was written named “Liber Primus” that elaborates the characteristics of a circadian.
*** No one knows actually what Cicada 3301 was about.
More info: globalbizarre.com
