man, I'm just looking for office supplies
"Heavy Duty 3 Hole"
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/internet/10555088/Cicada-3301-update-the-baffling-internet-mystery-is-back.html
Cicada 3301 update: the baffling internet mystery is back
A third instalment of the infamous internet puzzle appeared over the weekend, this time featuring William Blake, Masonic stars and a promise of ‘enlightenment’
07 January 2014
Wanted: willing puzzle fans to help solve the internet’s most complicated and enduring mystery. Only those conversant in hexidecimal cryptology, medieval Welsh poetry and classical music theory – among many others – need apply.
After a 12 month hiatus, Cicada 3301 – a complex collection of anonymously-set puzzles, without apparent purpose, that have nevertheless held thousands of amateur web sleuths rapt – has made a reappearance.
When the Telegraph first reported on the underground phenomenon last November, global interest intensified in the shadowy organisation – and the elaborate series of cryptographic puzzles apparently aimed at recruiting expert programmers.
And the Cicada’s re-emergence is exactly on schedule, too. The first set of puzzles, identified by images of the insect, appeared on January 5th 2012.
A message left anonymously on notorious website 4Chan simply read: “We are looking for highly intelligent individuals. To find them, we have devised a test…”
After a series of increasingly complex riddles – ranging from cyberpunk literature to voicemail messages to posters affixed to streetlights around the globe – the mysterious organisation behind the tests went quiet. Only for another set of teasers to appear exactly one year later, on January 4th 2013.
Again, solvers were faced with another formidably eclectic range of subjects – from ancient Hebrew code tables to Anglo-Saxon runes to Victoria occultist Aleister Crowley. Within a few weeks the puzzles stopped, with only a select few allowed through to a hallowed “inner sanctum” of Cicada.
And, of course, no-one was left any the wiser as to the source or ultimate purpose of the puzzles. Were they part of an elaborate PR campaign for a new Alternate Reality Game? A recruitment drive by the CIA, NSA or MI6? Or just a bit of fun?
But while another set of posers was anticipated during the first week of 2014, this year was different. Such widespread coverage had led some commentators to wonder if, like the insect itself, the organisation might be scared back underground.
Worse, some feared it might lead to widespread “trolling” – hoaxers trying to pass off their own puzzles as legitimate Cicada tests, further muddying the water.
Indeed, the first week of January has seen dozens of messages appearing on messageboards purporting to be from Cicada – some of which were elaborate enough to be believable. And yet all of which have been proved fake.
Until, that is, just before 11pm on January 5th. A Twitter account previously used by the Cicada organisation released a message, bearing the faint image of a cicada, to its 700 followers.
"Hello," it read. "Epiphany is upon you. Your pilgrimage has begun. Enlightenment awaits. Good luck. 3301."
Enthusiasts have since confirmed the message has the necessary PGP signature – a common encryption method used for privacy – to prove it is legitimately from Cicada 3301.
And so the hunt is underway once more. Already, a debate has begun online into the relevance of “Epiphany”, as January 6 is the Christian feast day known as Epiphany.
But by examining the image for steganography – a technique used to hide data inside images, sometimes used by paedophiles or terrorist organisations – solvers have already revealed a quote: "The work of a private man/ who wished to transcend,/ He trusted himself, / to produce from within."
Further analysis with a program called Outguess has revealed a link to Self-Reliance, a treatise on transcendentalism by American poet Ralph Waldo Emerson.
When run through a cipher, the excerpt reveals the phrase “For Every Thing That Lives Is Holy” and a new image – a collage of artworks from The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, by the English poet and painter William Blake.
Specifically, it features a collage of his works Nebuchadnezzer, The Ancient Of Days and Newton – with a faint marking of a cicada tucked into the bottom of the picture.
But the images are arranged in such a way that some solvers are now debating whether the image is supposed to represent a Thelema star (a hexagram developed by Aleister Crowley) or an image of a Masonic Square.
Either way, the pursuit of a solution continues. Enthusiasts wishing to join in the debate can access an internet chat relay – while a Wiki is constantly updating and sharing progress, with helpful explanations.
And after three years, who knows – perhaps, in terms of determining the purpose and source of Cicada 3301, we may be finally getting closer to what that initial image promises: “enlightenment”.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/jan/10/cicada-3301-i-tried-the-hardest-puzzle-on-the-internet-and-failed-spectacularly
Cicada 3301: I tried the hardest puzzle on the internet and failed spectacularly
No one knows who sets it or what the prize is at the end, but Cicada 3301 is back for its third year, and the internet has gone wild
10 Jan 2014
The hardest puzzle on the internet is not, perhaps, something to be attempted on whim during a quiet January afternoon.
But ever since I first heard about Cicada 3301, a mysterious event somewhere at the intersection of a game, a competition and a job interview, I'd wanted to test my mettle. It couldn't be that hard, right?
Wrong.
Cicada 3301 first appeared in January 2012, with a picture posted on 4Chan, the notorious message board which has given birth to everything from Lolcats to Anonymous.
In white text on a black background, the posted message read: "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."
It was signed "3301".
That message led to a series of puzzles, each harder than the last. The first few were just about solvable by a canny individual working alone, requiring little more than mild coding ability and wordplay to get past. But as participants fell deeper into the rabbit hole, the references became less obvious – one clue involved a poem from a collection of medieval Welsh manuscripts, another a quote from a William Gibson book which was only released on 3.5 inch floppies.
Co-operating on chatrooms and message boards, a growing collection of puzzle solvers broke the codes, one by one. When the game moved into the real world – a series of GPS co-ordinates were posted, leading to QR codes attached to lampposts over five different nations, from Poland to Australia – it was clear that no single person could hope to solve everything.
But as quickly as the co-operation was encouraged, it was snuffed out. The final puzzle directed players to an address for a website on Tor, the anonymous browser now best known for its use by the Silk Road black market. But only the fastest movers ever got to see what was on the page: it was shortly blanked, and replaced with the statement "We want the best, not the followers." For those deemed "followers", Cicada was over.
>11pm on January 5th. A Twitter account previously used by the Cicada organisation released a message, bearing the faint image of a cicada, to its 700 followers.
>"Hello," it read. "Epiphany is upon you. Your pilgrimage has begun. Enlightenment awaits. Good luck. 3301."
>Enthusiasts have since confirmed the message has the necessary PGP signature – a common encryption method used for privacy – to prove it is legitimately from Cicada 3301.
>And so the hunt is underway once more. Already, a debate has begun online into the relevance of “Epiphany”, as January 6 is the Christian feast day known as Epiphany.
>But by examining the image for steganography – a technique used to hide data inside images, sometimes used by paedophiles or terrorist organisations – solvers have already revealed a quote: "The work of a private man/ who wished to transcend,/ He trusted himself, / to produce from within."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/11B-X-1371
11B-X-1371 is an early-2015 viral video sent to GadgetZZ.com, the Swedish tech blog that publicized it. The black-and-white segment is two minutes in length; its title came from the plaintext of a base64 string written on the DVD. It depicts a person wearing what appears to be a plague doctor costume walking and standing around in a dilapidated abandoned building, with a forest visible through former window openings in the wall behind it. Accompanied by a soundtrack of loud, discordant buzzing noise, the masked figure holds up a hand with an irregularly blinking light. The film did not have any credits or claims to authorship.
Messages, many in commonly used ciphers and encryption systems, have been found hidden in the video and its sound spectrogram, as well as images of tortured and mutilated people. Most of the messages have been decoded by participants in an ongoing Reddit thread, and the images sourced to notable murder investigations such as the Boston Strangler. They have been interpreted as implying a threat of bioterrorism against the United States, although it has also been speculated that the video is in reality a prank, a viral marketing stunt for an upcoming film or video game, or a student film.
After it first came to light in October 2015, it was found that it had been posted to YouTube several months earlier, along with a similarly threatening message in binary code. The poster of that video, known as AETBX, has suggested to inquiring journalists that GadgetZZ is not telling the truth about how it came to possess the video. Internet investigators managed to establish that it was filmed in the former Zofiówka Sanatorium outside Otwock, Poland, sometime between November 2013 and the video's release.
2017 Lubbock Texas, Gary Graves
Sad Satan
dig
https://www.lubbockonline.com/local-news/news/crime-and-courts/2017-06-21/lubbock-man-arraigned-federal-charges-after-girlfriend
https://www.lubbockonline.com/crime-and-courts/local-news/news/2017-10-20/lubbock-man-sentenced-federal-child-porn-charge
Oct 20, 2017
A 32-year-old man was sentenced Friday to 9 years in prison after admitting in August to viewing prepubescent child pornography on his cell phone.
Senior U.S. Federal District Judge Sam Cummings handed Gary Graves a 108-month prison sentence for a count of possession of prepubescent child pornography as part of a plea agreement. Graves faced a prison sentence of up to 20 years.
Before Cummings imposed the sentence, Graves apologized for his actions and said he was ready to accept his punishment.
“I’ve come to terms with what I’ve done,” he said. “I thought it was harmless.”
Graves pleaded guilty in Aug. 2 to the charge of possession of prepubescent child pornography. He admitted to downloading child pornography on his phone.
Graves’ girlfriend called Lubbock police Feb. 5 after she found child pornography on his phone. According to a search warrant, the woman was using Graves’ phone while he was being held at the Lubbock County Jail on an unrelated burglary charge. The responding police officers found multiple images that depicted prepubescent children involved in sexual acts with adults.
Graves was released in June on a personal recognizance bond. However, the bond was revoked on Oct. 5 after he admitted to violating the terms of his release by smoking marijuana.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sad_Satan