[ARG] The Pizza Code Mystery

[Doctor_Pie]

@Skidoo

Back to the bold/italicized letters, I always thought that the bold “s” followed by the g could be taken as:

“Seek code out he is AI watch in Sector G”

Not sure about the capitol H, could be (Horn).
I know there is a hidden “Superbus via Inscientiae” emblem across the bridge of the dam in the building. There are also a number of other things in Sector G that could be related to AI.

Maybe you have to feed the dam monster pizza.

Interesting idea. Ill go check in the levels of Black Mesa and see if I can find anything related to sector G

@JeffMOD

Either that, or HALOS.txt should not be HALOS.txt.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but decrypting it with Benaloh and/or Phaillier encryption has failed, correct? So what if the data is supposed to be another format? Like, I dunno, a .rar file or something else that can be password-protected.

Thats a interesting idea.

[faed]

@Skidoo

First, the part that begins "Report{BMRF-HALOS . . . " looks very similar to programming language. There are no functions called or anything fancy like that, and I don’t recognize any specific languages, but there is definitely something going on there.

I think its LaTeX.

[danielsangeo]

@Doctor Pie

Interesting idea. Ill go check in the levels of Black Mesa and see if I can find anything related to sector G

Sector G is the dam section of the game.

[Doctor_Pie]

@danielsangeo

Sector G is the dam section of the game.

I kinda figured. I looked around quite a bit in that area of the game. I didnt find much, but I did notice a helicopter in the skybox (not the one that attacks) - to be exact, a helicopter that people wouldnt normally notice playing the game.

[P_PORTAL_RTAL]

the helicopter is watching you!!

the H in HALOS probely stand for Helicopter

[Toxyn]

that helicopter isn’t much, I noticed a non-moving jet in that map where you teleport to the shack. they start moving when you walk past a certain checkpoint or trigger or whatever.

[Doctor_Pie]

@toxyn

that helicopter isn’t much, I noticed a non-moving jet in that map where you teleport to the shack. they start moving when you walk past a certain checkpoint or trigger or whatever.

The helicopter doesnt move the entire level. I kept watching it every time I went past a big part of the level. It never moved. Why is it there? Why doesnt it move?

[imadoofus]

Maybe HALOS can take control of heliochopters.

Well, hey, it’s a long shot, but either it’s a left-over prop somebody forgot to remove, or something hidden that might relate to the mystery.

[Doctor_Pie]

@imadoofus

Well, hey, it’s a long shot, but either it’s a left-over prop somebody forgot to remove, or something hidden that might relate to the mystery.

My gut says that atleast 70% of the chance is the first one - a left-over.

[Flavrans]

@Gunsrequiem

First, the part that begins "Report{BMRF-HALOS . . . " looks very similar to programming language. There are no functions called or anything fancy like that, and I don’t recognize any specific languages, but there is definitely something going on there.

@faed

I think its LaTeX.

It’s a BibTeX entry (except for a missing “@” character preceding “Report”).

EDIT:

According to BibTeX syntax, BMRF-HALOS-AITR-0001 is a key that uniquely identifies the entry (in LaTeX/BibTeX the key is used when citing or cross-referencing the entry). AITR-0001 is also found at the bottom of the Tempus Omnia Revelant page. This seems to suggest that the contents of the Tempus Omnia Revelant page make up a report filed under the file identifier (or file no.) BMRF-HALOS-AITR-0001 or AITR-0001. The question is if this key or identifier has anything to do with solving the puzzle.

[AngelSG]

@flavrans9

AITR-0001. The question is if this key or identifier has anything to do with solving the puzzle.

AITR means Artificial Intelligence Technical Repport. I’ve read a couple of AITR from the MIT several months ago, I do not remember why I related that specific AITR’s with the ARG, but I remember reading them. It’s probably nothing and I was just looking into them because I had nothing else to look into. Here they are

https://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/5461

Maybe that part it’s just there to add flavour, but I don’t know.

I’m starting to think that this is just not solvable as is, something is missing, either nobody found it, or it’s not there to be found.

[Doctor_Pie]

@AngelSG

AITR means Artificial Intelligence Technical Repport. I’ve read a couple of AITR from the MIT several months ago, I do not remember why I related that specific AITR’s with the ARG, but I remember reading them.

Maybe that part it’s just there to add flavour, but I don’t know.

The AITR = Artifical Intelligence Technical Report thing does help. It confirms my suspicion that there is some kind of AI trying to either communicate with us, or somebody is trying to contact an AI.

[Flavrans]

OK, I’ve just discovered that there’s an encryption tool in the Source SDK. It’s called vice and it’s based on the ICE cipher, which is a 64-bit block cipher. Apparently, it’s used for tamper-proofing script files.

In the solution to IRC clue 5 we find the following sentence: “Just to remind you in case of emergencies that the password to the HALOS files is BENALOHPAILLIER.”

Could it be possible that the phrase “In Case of Emergencies”, or ICE for short, is a reference to the ICE cipher?

I’m not getting too excited yet, because we’ve chased down so many of these rabbit holes that have led to nowhere. But maybe this is worth looking into.

EDIT:

OK, so this vice tool requires a key of 64-bits (8 bytes). The BENALOHPAILLIER password is too long, or the key is something else. However, I’ve been looking at source code and it appears that the ICE cipher implementation has a parameter that sets the encryption level, and the size of the key depends on this level parameter. The vice tool is hard-coded to use level 0, so that means we’ll have to modify the source code a bit in order to use a different encryption level.

[Gunsrequiem]

@flavrans9

In the solution to IRC clue 5 we find the following sentence: “Just to remind you in case of emergencies that the password to the HALOS files is BENALOHPAILLIER.”

Could it be possible that the phrase “In Case of Emergencies”, or ICE for short, is a reference to the ICE cipher?

Considering how sly some of the other clues have been, this is not farfetched at all. Some of the ARGs that Storm has been a part of apparently had a lot of little nuances that were night impossible to unearth, so this is about as possible as everything else we’ve tried. Anyone up for doing the grunt work?

EDIT:

"-decrypt
Decypt files with given key. "

Seems pretty easy to run, although we run into the same problem as before: knowing the passkey.

[Doctor_Pie]

@Gunsrequiem

"-decrypt
Decypt files with given key. "

Seems pretty easy to run, although we run into the same problem as before: knowing the passkey.

The key… Ugh. This is going to take longer than I, and maybe some of you, thought.

[3noneTwo]

@flavrans9

OK, so this vice tool requires a key of 64-bits (8 bytes). The BENALOHPAILLIER password is too long, or the key is something else. However, I’ve been looking at source code and it appears that the ICE cipher implementation has a parameter that sets the encryption level, and the size of the key depends on this level parameter. The vice tool is hard-coded to use level 0, so that means we’ll have to modify the source code a bit in order to use a different encryption level.

“AITR0001” is 8 bytes! But that’d be too easy, wouldn’t it.

Just to clarify: It’s the 752 Hex Code that needs to be solved, correct? Does the vice tool decrypt text strings, or is it only used to encrypt/decrypt files? (Is there even a difference in this case?)

[Flavrans]

@3noneTwo

Just to clarify: It’s the 752 Hex Code that needs to be solved, correct?

Yes, the long string of 752 hexadecimal digits (b32b003a35badd66…), to be specific.

@3noneTwo

Does the vice tool decrypt text strings, or is it only used to encrypt/decrypt files? (Is there even a difference in this case?)

The vice tool only encrypts/decrypts files, regardless of their contents. It doesn’t understand hex format, so you’ll have to convert the hex code into a binary data file and use that file as input. You can download the raw binary data file here.

I couldn’t find an .exe for the official vice tool, though. There’s a working link to a standalone version that doesn’t depend on steam on this page. However, VirusTotal shows suspicious scan results on the .exe file. They might be false positives, but it’s probably best to steer clear of that file, just in case. It would be best to compile it from source yourself. I don’t have the necessary tools installed to build a Windows .exe atm. However, I’ve tried a version that compiles under Linux available here (it’s the same version as the one described on this page).

The syntax is slightly different than that of the official vice tool:

vice -d -x .txt -k PizzaLie halos.raw

This will decrypt halos.raw to halos.txt using the key PizzaLie. The tool can’t detect whether a decryption is successful or not, so an incorrect key will just produce a file that looks as random as the halos.raw file.

I tried modifying the source so that it uses an encryption level of 2, where the key size is 8*2=16 characters, and tried a bunch of variations of “BENALOH PAILLIER”, “BENALOH_PAILLIER”, “Benaloh_Paillier”, etc. as keys. But alas, no luck.

EDIT:

I’m wondering if I should try setting the encryption level parameter to 7 (based on the “level seven cases” clue). But then I would need a 56 byte long key! Do we have anything that would fit into 56 characters that would make any sense to use as key?

@3noneTwo

“AITR0001” is 8 bytes! But that’d be too easy, wouldn’t it.

Just as the “BENALOHPAILLIER” password would be too easy when IRC clue 5 explicitly says that the password to the HALOS files is “BENALOHPAILLER”. Clearly, there must be another layer to the puzzle than simply finding the right cipher and/or tool. The question is whether or not the hex code itself is a HALOS file, since there is no way to tell. Although, when stormseeker updated the OP, after a user complained about the OP not being up to date, among other things, he added the hex code puzzle under the heading “HALOS FILE”. Was he referring to the contents of the hex code? Or was he simply referring to HALOS.txt, which was the file that contained the ASCII85 encoded message which in turn contained the 752 digit hex code?

Regarding passwords, there is also this quote from a PM sent to Gunsrequiem by forum user 0418_08151814, who was revealed to be stormseeker in disguise:

@0418_08151814

The password will probably be hinted at, perhaps in a less than obvious way.

[Mr_Sir_Shpee]

Hi, found out about the ARG recently and I’m afraid there’s not anything I can really help with, but could stormseeker’s fake name 0418_08151814 mean anything?

[Gunsrequiem]

@Mr. Sir Shpee

Hi, found out about the ARG recently and I’m afraid there’s not anything I can really help with, but could stormseeker’s fake name 0418_08151814 mean anything?

It simply corresponds with “Dr. Horn”

04 = D
18 = R

08 = H
15 = O
18 = R
14 = N

[CPU]

@flavrans9

I’m wondering if I should try setting the encryption level parameter to 7 (based on the “level seven cases” clue). But then I would need a 56 byte long key! Do we have anything that would fit into 56 characters that would make any sense to use as key?

I was convinced that the bmrf page was critical in revealing a key. I just wasn’t sure where it would go though. Your question about a 56 character key immediately drew me to what I believed was part of the answer AND it just happens to be 56 characters. Try this:

CRITICALFAULTCANNOTCONNECTTOLOGONSERVER1.192.11.156:2828

NOTE: There is no space between the 5 and the 6, for some reason it’s just appearing that way