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Sleep Theories · July 26 · 1 hr 48 min

Cicada 3301 Explained: The Unsolved 2012 Internet Mystery | Conspiracy Theories

In January 2012, a plain black image appeared on an internet message board. White text. No signature. It said someone was looking for highly intelligent individuals — and that a test had already begun. It became known as Cicada 3301. Over the following weeks, thousands of strangers across the world chased it through steganography, book ciphers, prime numbers, the Tor network, and PGP encryption — until the trail stepped off the screen entirely, and posters appeared taped to lampposts in Warsaw, Seoul, Paris, Sydney, and ten other cities on five continents. Then the people who solved it stopped posting. No company ever claimed it. No government ever admitted it. And most of Liber Primus, the book of runes Cicada released in 2014, has never been read.

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In January 2012, a plain black image appeared on an internet message board. White text. No signature. It said someone was looking for highly intelligent individuals — and that a test had already begun.

It became known as Cicada 3301.

Over the following weeks, thousands of strangers across the world chased it through steganography, book ciphers, prime numbers, the Tor network, and PGP encryption — until the trail stepped off the screen entirely, and posters appeared taped to lampposts in Warsaw, Seoul, Paris, Sydney, and ten other cities on five continents. Then the people who solved it stopped posting. No company ever claimed it. No government ever admitted it. And most of Liber Primus, the book of runes Cicada released in 2014, has never been read.

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