The video discusses the mystery surrounding Cicada 3301, an organization that posted a series of complex puzzles on the internet. The story begins with an anonymous image posted on the 4chan forum's paranormal section in January 2012. This image, which appears to be a blank black square, contains a hidden message that guides viewers to a series of increasingly complex puzzles.
The first puzzle involves deciphering a hidden message within the image using Caesar's Cipher and an ASCII table. The next step leads to a subreddit where the posts, seemingly random, are actually part of the puzzle. A specific post by a user named ImagoOnNib indicates a book code that leads to a specific book.
The book, Mabinogion, contains the story of "The Fountain Lady", which is a coded message. This message, when decrypted using the numbers from the book code, leads to a phone number. Calling this number plays a message from Cicada 3301, instructing viewers to check back at a specific time.
Upon checking the site again, viewers are presented with a series of coordinates scattered around the world. Visiting these locations reveals posters with the Cicada 3301 logo and a QR code. Scanning these codes leads to two different messages, both ending with a cryptic message from Cicada 3301.
The video ends with a teaser for the next part, where the viewer will have to enter the Deep Web to decipher more puzzles from Cicada 3301.
1. The story begins in January 2012 on the paranormal section of the 4chan forum, where an anonymous image was posted. This image hinted at a highly complex puzzle involving an organization that spread posters and codes around the world, with references to ancient books and obscure religions .
2. The image, which was posted by an anonymous user on 4chan, contained a hidden message. This message, when opened as a text file, revealed a code referring to Caesar's Cipher, an old encryption method .
3. The image contained a lot of little squares, which turned out to be important. These squares were scattered across the image, and when their positions were converted back to a message using Outguess, a software for hiding messages within images, a sequence of numbers and letters was found .
4. This sequence was part of a PGP subscription, an encryption system. The PGP keys were put on the MIT servers, with the public key available for everyone and the secret key only known to Cicada 3301 .
5. Cicada 3301, the organization behind the puzzles, left a key verification program on the MIT servers. This program could be used to verify if a message was officially signed by Cicada 3301 .
6. A website called "Is it Cicada?" was created to automate this verification process. By copying and pasting a message into the website, users could determine if it was from Cicada 3301 .
7. The final puzzle involved deciphering a book code from a duck image. The code, when translated, pointed to a story from King Arthur's legend called "The Fountain Lady" .
8. The story concluded with the discovery of posters with the Cicada 3301 logo and QR codes at specific coordinates around the world. Scanning these codes revealed two different messages, both ending with the statement "We want the best, not the followers. The first to arrive here will receive the prize. Good luck. 3301" .