On Saturday 2 April GCHQ and The Times Cheltenham Science Festival will launch a major new Code Cracking Challenge. The Challenge, designed by Nick, a member of GCHQ's staff, is made up of six sections, each containing three individual puzzles, making 18 puzzles in all. The puzzles include word searches, anagrams, name networks, ciphers, word association, crosswords…and others! All are designed to deceive, perplex and challenge, even the most determined quiz meister! The final answer is a hidden word, but to work it out it is necessary to work through all parts of the Challenge.
The solutions and help on how to solve each of the six sections of the Challenge will be hosted on the GCHQ site and will be released one at a time on each of the six days of the Festival from 7-12 June.
A VIP Science Festival prize package will be awarded to the first person to unravel the clues, work out the final word solution and send it in before 3 June. Full details of the prize and how to enter will be available online.
Nick, creator of the Challenge, has provided these words of guidance for those embarking on the Challenge:
"There is nothing in the Challenge that requires information that can't be found by some imaginative Internet searching and lateral thinking. If you enjoy cryptic crosswords and similar puzzles then you will enjoy this!"
The Challenge will culminate with an opportunity to meet Nick for a session of code cracking advice at the festival in Cheltenham Town Hall on Sunday 12 June from 10 – 11 am.
In addition to the prize Code Cracking Challenge, GCHQ has also provided an easier Challenge for younger quiz enthusiasts. This is also available through the GCHQ and Festival websites.
GCHQ will again be fully participating in all aspects of this year's Cheltenham Science Festival. On Saturday 11 June, Toby from GCHQ will be at the Town Hall from 10 – 11 am to discuss Security in the Computer Age. This is a talk for families about online security and will provide useful tips on how to keep children, money and computers safe.
GCHQ will also be working with Gloucestershire STEMworks to support their interactive Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths (STEM) workshops for local schools. This will encourage young people to consider how STEM subjects can be applied in the real world. These workshops have always proven extremely popular at previous festivals and will again provide the opportunity for young people to work with GCHQ and STEMworks staff to carry out exciting code cracking experiments.
GCHQ will of course also be fully participating in the Discovery Zone with a stand featuring different aspects of GCHQ's present day work, and information and artefacts relating to its history.
31 March 2011
Notes to Editors:
The Times Cheltenham Science Festival – 7 to 12 June 2011
'Unquestionably the leading Science Festival in the country' Professor Lord Winston
The Times Cheltenham Science Festival is a six-day celebration of science, engineering and the arts and is produced by Cheltenham Festivals. A rare opportunity for the public to come face-to-face with around 300 of the world's leading scientists and thinkers, the festival annually sells in excess of 28,000 tickets whilst the free interactive Discover Zone attracts over 10,000 visitors. The five day festival promises a mix of serious debate, live experiments and surprising discoveries all based at Cheltenham Town Hall.
www.cheltenhamfestivals.com/science