![comments related Today, a homeless looking man handed me $50 and this note. Do any of you have any idea what it means? 1812 (self.AskReddit) 1 day Dear Reddit, I work in NYC, and was dragged into a very curious situation today. I was taking the 1 train from midtown to the financial district and as usual, the train was pretty packed. I bumped into a raggedy dressed man as we got on and he shot me a quick smile. I though nothing of it until he went to get off at 14th street and he handed me a $50 bil along with a note. Before I could even open my mouth to ask him a question, he was gone. Below you find pictures of both the front and back of the note Front: http://i.imgur.com/ZxcVR.jpg Back: http://i.imgur.com/akhku.jpg I've been looking at the note all day, and needless to say, I have no idea what it means. It's handwritten on a 3X3 square piece of paper with no identifying marks and no watermarks. There's a handdrawn grid and at a couple spots, the cells of the grid are combined. The note has random character written throughout it and the bottom quarter is filled with random shapes and numbers. Maybe I'm just reading way too far into things, and he was just another crazy New Yorker, but I figured it would be neat to see if anyone has run into this similar situation. Do any of you have any idea as to what the note says if EDIT: Just got to my friend's house in Jersey, didn't expect this post to take off, but I've managed to read some of the comments and see that most of you are saying that the letters on the back are the cipher. That was the first thing I tried and it failed; others said that the 50 may have something to do with it, the only thing out of the ordinary that I saw on the bill was a number written along the back of the bill, but the "7" on the bill doesn't match the one on the note. I've taken pictures with my phone: Front: http://i.imgur.com/9yZo5.jpg Back: http://i.imgur.com/DtcoU.jpg I'll be stepping out for the night, but I should be back on later tonight. Edit to Edit: There's also some shading on the front of the bill that may mean something EDIT 2 As solved by SirSpam28: It comes out to: There's plenty more money to make figure this out and prepare to meet july 19 fifty sixth and sixth hot dog stand outside [intentional left blank] cafe ask for mister [intentionally left blank] Just got home and saw that the code was cracked, I want to say thank you to the reddit community for helping me figure this out. As for what I am going to do, my gut is telling me that I wont be putting myself in danger, but I will be taking precautions by letting my loved o cha know where I am going. I will keep Reddit updated to believe it Alo someone trolling me, but The message claims to be from the ragged man himself the section that has a red box around it is m rs th the message ca but r trying the method that SirSpam used, it doesn't seem to follow. The message makes reference to the use re f the message: I believe this message was a troll message, thus it's been redacted] I will still try and meet on the 19th as the original note said, but was wondering if this note may change anything/warn me, seeing as he has at least some of my information EDIT 4 Sorry for not updating as frequently as most of you would like, but I'm pretty much ass to elbows in work right now, and my job has a filter on reddit. Just stepped out on my lunch break from work and headed to my local Starbucks. I've kept updated on my phone through Alien Blue. The last code also decoded to read I believe thi troll message, th been redacted I plan to be there today, and I figure that as long as its a public place, I should be safe. I have a date tonight arou l post any developments then 6, so I wont be home EDIT 5 So as many of you saw on the stream, I went to the site that was mentioned in the previous message today only to find that the "bluejay" hadn't showed up and if they had they hadn't identified themselves. My night did not go well ng the taxi r I decided to check some of the voicema umerous ones calling me names like "troll", "f--", "p----" etc, and quite a few death threats personally cause some harm somehow, I apologize, but I'm go couple questions and theories that keep coming Is this some y to prove that this isn't involved i , pe ever I ca re you th ish I could be creative to set something like thi hts message, many things came art of this ould point to a friend sending said message on Redd been trolled las se SO escription of the rag What do you think of these theories: *you work for BAS ntertainmen not work for BASE ertainment, you can call them up and ask them *The old man in blue at 4:00 ard on Monday, it is possible this man was Blu y the crowd that lly swarmed him think its Time travel? Prime Seriou know ops. As a a message [ON REDDIT, NOT MY PHONE] if you want *SOLVED(Kin i too have investigated. The "hobo" is actually H. Keith Melton who is the head of that Spy Exhibit thing that is going up. All that you need to do is look for distinguishing facial features on the hobo. What i noticed was the nose, its either fake or very different. Look at the noise very carefully and how it is long, pointed, and seems to have a secondary ridge above the nostril: http://i.imgur.com/MkgWe image of Mr Me off the internet: http://www.harpercollins.com/harperimages/author pg bla t is in the picture. Is there anyway that so can get in touch with 558 comments share op 200 comme show 500](https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/list/000/574/791/d12.png "d12.png")
![卤messages: messages : vo Scoops. Get Hug × 2012 NBA free agenc × 0 Best I Ever Had-Drax ← → C Owww.redd.t.com/message/messages/#page-2 NuclearPotatoes. expand all collapse all [-] from NuclearPotatoes (_) sent 3 hours ago You cheated, game over permalink report block user mark unread reply full comments AzyzutSecret note expand all collapse all C- from Azyzut () sent 3 hours ago Thought it was really ironic that your name was "delverofsecrets" and you got this secret note P I assumed it was a throwaway account. I'm really excited to see the follow-up of this on the 19th! permalink report block user mark unread reply full comments 2220944379I am Mr. Input. expand all collapse all I-] from 2220944379 (_) sent 3 hours ago AKC. You have You may not believe me, but I will remind you of your personalized backpack recruited the help of friends, the offer is now on the table for them too. I cannot have strangers inquire about me, rather we will use a proxy. Here is the next step: DWY JLRR QUBPKSJ IL NDLM OQD OUCEQMW KGXI CSH RFRM XL WEZUXKJ. YME QLPRBAZ OQD TPVJG HPM UK CQjS H. PPVD BFSRST NJYT KR. BFPU EWP BMHY BTK WL VGB FXK R PXFE DTC GPBQL QWHKI JFA QRPE EJW EYC KU HCB JHGN permalink report block user mark unread reply full comments Leaky_Minor )make a follow up post!! expand all collapse all [-] from Leaky_Minor () sent 4 hours ago hey, I saw your 50 dollar homeless man run in post, and obviously someone has already solved it, so, you should go on that date and time and see what happens!!! and you NEED to make a follow up post, because myself and hundreds of other redditors are probably wondering whats going to happen too XD good luck man! permalink report block user mark unread reply full comments pc18311solved! expand all collapse all -1 from pcl8311 sent 4 hours ago](https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/list/000/349/153/735.png "735.png")
New York City Cryptic Subway Code
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Background
On July 11th, 2012, Redditor delverofsecrets submitted a post titled "Today, a homeless looking man handed me $50 and this note. Do any of you have any idea what it means?"[1] which linked to a photograph of a cryptic note that the OP (original poster) apparently received from a mysterious man on the 1 train in Manhattan, New York City.
Dear Reddit, I work in NYC, and was dragged into a very curious situation today. I was taking the 1 train from midtown to the financial district and as usual, the train was pretty packed. I bumped into a raggedy dressed man as we got on and he shot me a quick smile. I though nothing of it until he went to get off at 14th street and he handed me a $50 bill along with a note. Before I could even open my mouth to ask him a question, he was gone. Below you find pictures of both the front and back of the note.
Notable Developments
The post instantly sparked a lengthy discussion about the nature of the code and reached the front page of Reddit with more than 30,000 up votes in less than 24 hours. It was subsequently cross-posted to Reddit's /r/cryptography and the image was verified as a cryptic code by multiple accounts. Less than two hours later, Redditor SirSpam28 identified the code as a Bifid Cipher that substitues alphabet letter G's with A's and provided the translation:
There's plenty more money to make figure this out and prepare to meet July 19th, Fifty Six and Sixth. There's a hot dog stand outside Rue57 cafe. Ask for Mr. Input.
Rumors of Viral Marketing
As the peculiar story continued to get more bizarre, some Redditors began speculating the possibility of a viral marketing scheme for the upcoming Batman movie Dark Knight Rises on the basis that it is scheduled for release on the same date, July 19th. Others also supported the theory by comparing the mysterious ragged man to the Batman villain Riddler. On the following day of July 12th, the story was covered by various internet news blogs including Mashable[2] and Gawker.[4]
Change of Plan
A few hours after Redditor SirSpam28 posted the decoded message, the OP followed up with a private message that he received from Redditor 2220944379, who apparently claimed to be the ragged man on the street. In the thread, OP also noted that the mysterious sender was able to recall his name displayed on his personalized backpack. The message read:
You may not believe me, but I will remind you of your personalized backpack [personal information redacted] You have recruited the help of friends, the offer is now on the table for them too. I cannot have strangers inquire about me, rather we will use a proxy. Here is the next step: DWY JLRR QUBPKSJ IL NDLM OQD OUCEQMW KGXI CSH RFRM XL WEZUXKJ. YME QLPRBAZ OQD TPVJG HPM UK CQJS H. PPVD BFSRST NJYT KR. BFPU EWP BMHY BTK WL VGB FXK R PXFE DTC GPBQL QWHKI JFA QRPE EJW EYC KLJ HCB JHGN.
The translation of the second cipher was eventually submitted by Redditor icedmilkflopr, who used the online cryptanalysis tool Autokey Cipher to decode the message. The OP later updated the post and revealed that he plans to follow the instruction and see what happens.
YOU HAVE MANAGED TO FIND THE MESSAGE WITH THE HELP OF FRIENDS. YOU CHANGED THE RULES NOW SO WILL I. JULY TWELVE FOUR PM. FIND THE BLUE JAY AT SIX AND A HALF AND FIFTY SIXTH AND TELL HIM YOU ARE THE LAST.
Offline Meetup
But the OP wasn't the only person to be puzzled by the message. As 4:00pm (ET) drew near on July 12th, nearly one hundred people reportedly showed up on the corner of 56th Street and 6th Avenue in Manhattan. The sight of the flash mob-style gathering was streamed online in real time via USTREAM and people on the scene tweeted real-time updates using the hashtag #bluejay.
Despite the turnout, the crowd eventually dissolved shortly after meeting up with the OP who started the thread. It was later reported by Gawker that an old man dressed in all blue was briefly mobbed after the crowd mistakenly identified him as Redditor 2220944379.
External References
[1] Reddit – Today, a homeless looking man handed me $50 and this note. Do any of you have any idea what it means?
[2] Reddit – /r/cryptography
[3] Secret Code Breaker – AutoKey Cipher
[4] Gawker – This Encrypted Note Could Be a Covert Job Application or a Dark Knight PR Stunt, But It’s Freaking Cool Either Way [UPDATE]
[5] Reddit – The Face of We Just Got Duped
[6] Wikia – Batman Gotham Adventures
[7] Mashable – Reddit Unlocks the Secret of Cryptic Subway Code [UPDATED]
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Top Comments
amanda b. Moderator
Jul 12, 2012 at 11:08PM EDT
Lucid
Jul 12, 2012 at 05:47PM EDT