Cicada 3301 is the name of three sets of puzzles posted online under the name "3301" between 2012 and 2014. The first puzzle began on January 4, 2012, on a website called 4chan and lasted about a month. A second set of puzzles started one year later on January 4, 2013. A third set began after a new clue was shared on Twitter on January 4, 2014. This third puzzle has not been solved yet. The goal of the puzzles was to find "intelligent individuals" by challenging them to solve complex problems. No new puzzles were posted on January 4, 2015. A new clue appeared on Twitter on January 5, 2016. Cicada 3301 sent their final confirmed message with a special digital signature in April 2017. This message said that any puzzles without a signature were not valid.

The puzzles involved topics like keeping data safe, creating and breaking secret codes, hiding messages in images or files, and staying anonymous online. Experts have called it "the most complex and mysterious puzzle of the Internet age." The Washington Post listed it as one of the "top 5 eeriest, unsolved mysteries of the Internet." Many people have guessed that the puzzles were used to recruit workers for groups like the NSA, CIA, MI6, Mossad, or a secret society. Others believe it was an alternate reality game, but no company or person has tried to make money from it.

Purpose

The purpose of the puzzles each year was said to be finding "highly intelligent individuals," though the real reason is still not known. Some people think Cicada 3301 is a secret group that wants to improve ways to keep information safe, private, and hidden, or that it is a cult or religion. People who solved the 2012 puzzle said that Cicada 3301 usually finds new members without using puzzles. However, they made the puzzles to find people who know about cryptography and computer security.

Resolution

In 2013, the first puzzle was solved by Marcus Wanner. He explained that people who solved the puzzles were asked questions about their support for freedom of information, online privacy, and opposition to censorship. Those who answered well were invited to join a private forum, where they were asked to create and finish a project meant to support the group’s goals. Marcus did not complete his work on a method to decode information, and the website was taken down. "Nox Populi," another winner, shared her experience with the project on her YouTube channel, which has the same name. The description on her channel says: "A series by one of the 2013 winners of the Cicada 3301 puzzle, showing the step-by-step solving process and discussing a more realistic, fact-based view of the organization." Today, she helps organize community activities about Cicada 3301 on a Discord server. Other groups of puzzle solvers still meet on message boards and forums.

The Cicada 3301 puzzles used many types of communication, including the Internet, telephone calls, original music, bootable Linux CDs, digital images, physical paper signs, and pages from unpublished books written in runes. There were two pieces of music, called "The Instar Emergence" and "Interconnectedness," that went along with the puzzles. However, neither was part of a regular music collection, and the composers or performers are unknown. Cicada 3301 also created a book titled Liber Primus (Latin for "First Book"), which has many pages, only some of which have been decoded. The puzzles used many different methods to hide or encode information, and they also referred to a wide range of books, poetry, artwork, and music. Each puzzle was signed with the same special digital key to prove it was real.

Allegations of illegal activity

In 2012, the Investigative Police (PDI) in the Los Andes Province of Chile said that Cicada 3301 is a "hacker group" that took part in illegal activities. Cicada 3301 responded by sending a PGP-signed message that said they were not involved in any illegal activities.

In July 2015, a group that called itself "3301" accessed the database of Planned Parenthood. However, this group did not seem to be connected to Cicada 3301. Later, Cicada 3301 sent another PGP-signed message stating they were not linked to this group in any way and said they did not support the group's use of their name, number, or symbols. The hacker group later confirmed they were not connected to Cicada 3301.

Legacy and popular culture

In 2014, the United States Navy created a cryptographic challenge inspired by the Cicada 3301 recruitment puzzles. This challenge was named Project Architeuthis.

A 2014 episode of the television show Person of Interest, titled "Nautilus," included a large-scale game similar to the Cicada 3301 puzzles. Both involve a series of worldwide cryptographic puzzles. However, the Nautilus episode uses images of a nautilus shell instead of a cicada logo. The show's creator, Jonathan Nolan, and producer, Greg Plageman, said in an interview that Cicada 3301 inspired the episode. They explained, "Episode 2, I'm especially interested in the topic behind it. Look up Cicada 3301 on the Internet. It's a very interesting concept that we then used in a larger story connected to our show."

The Cicada 3301 group is the subject of the 2021 comedy-thriller film Dark Web: Cicada 3301. Directed by Alan Ritchson, who also co-wrote the script with Joshua Montcalm, the film stars Jack Kesy, Conor Leslie, Ron Funches, Kris Holden-Ried, Andreas Apergis, and director Ritchson. The story follows a hacker who joins Cicada's recruitment game while avoiding the National Security Agency (NSA).

The Cicada 3301 puzzles are an important part of the visual novel Anonymous;Code.