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Like the other commenter I’m amused that they included rocks in the shredded notes to make up weight. I think something like this is unfortunately doomed to fa

Like the other commenter I’m amused that they included rocks in the shredded notes to make up weight. I think something like this is unfortunately doomed to fail, as whilst there might ideally be approximately 138 banknotes worth of mass in there, it seems likely that the shreds are from thousands of different banknotes, and the container holds only a fraction of each whole note. Therefore no matter how good your reconstruction is, you simply won’t have the right pieces to work with.

araes 3y ago
While you might not be able to construct the entire banknote, there would probably be a high chance of many partial constructions. In and of itself interesting from a partially complete puzzle perspective. Plus, attempting to match varying serial numbers, dates, reference marks, while still having each bill vary. Could probably be improved by doing 50-100 variations on each bill to give a general idea of the patterns possible within a zone. Such as: This area has 8 possible characters, with 36 possible entries /[a-zA-Z0-9]/. It has a fixed border with some constant pattern nearby. Show all the possible combos and then dice up the area a bunch of different ways. On the partial constructions topic: You have 350 of 1000 pieces of an image with some known general shape. How much of the image can you reconstruct while still missing 2/3 of the pieces? At the least has applications for image guessing. Also, agree on the false bank note contents, and how many people at the note shredding office are just stuffing their pockets with bank notes and then filling the cylinders with rocks? Great scam that probably almost nobody actually checks.
CapitalistCartr 3y ago
The practical value here isn't in banknotes, it's in shredded classified documents. That's the elephant in the room. And it's good for advancing pure research.
- nextaccountic 3y ago
  Shredding seems the wrong tool if one wants to dispose classified documents Why not incinerating, dissolving in acid, grinding into a fine powder, or something like that?
  - fifteen1506 3y ago
    Also questioned myself. My pet theory is big companies first shred and after send to be burned (or recycled). Plus a shredding machine us safer than a fire device.
    - flir 3y ago
      Cynically, if your insurance company says "4mm cross cut and a paper trail to prove it was done", then that's what you do. Why try harder? But yes, paper that's shredded by a specialist paper-shredding company is then typically baled up and sent for recycling.
  - dools 3y ago
    I compost all of my sensitive information that arrives by mail. And whenever I need to dispose of something I can’t compost, like an old drivers license, I cut it into pieces and drip feed the pieces into the garbage over the course of a few months. Call me paranoid but I think there will be a cottage industry in sifting through garbage once this tech gets mature enough!
    - 0cf8612b2e1e 3y ago
      Considering all of my confidential information has already been leaked by some tech entity or another, yeah a bit paranoid. Concentrated data is juicier than mining trash.
    - KennyBlanken 3y ago
      Your trash bags are ripped open and co-mingled as they're sorted through by workers as it zips by on a conveyor belt. You're being very, very excessively paranoid doing anything more than just cutting it into a piece or two across the ID number.
    - shwaj 3y ago
      Lol! I do that with drivers licenses too. I laugh at myself as I do it.
    - 3y ago
- lupire 3y ago
  That's a different problem. In the banknote, case the document is known in advance.
  - spitfire 3y ago
    Each banknote will have a unique serial number. So at least some part of the document will not be known in advance. Though serial numbers are well structured so you can take advantage of that.
- bookofjoe 3y ago
  >Seven Years After Embassy Seizure, Iran Still Prints U.S. Secrets https://www.nytimes.com/1986/07/10/world/7-years-after-embassy-seizure-iran-still-prints-us-secrets.html https://www.nytimes.com/1986/07/10/world/7-years-after-embas... https://archive.ph/EVbpX https://archive.ph/EVbpX >Among the most interesting papers are shredded secret documents pieced back together by the militants that detail attempts of the Central Intelligence Agency to recruit high-level Iranian officials, ayatollahs and exiles, foreign journalists and diplomats either as paid or ''unwitting'' agents in the months after the revolution in February 1979.
  - ok_dad 3y ago
    I’m surprised they could put them back together. When I shredded top secret documents in the navy when I was a kid, what came out into the bin outside was effectively powder. Those shredders could shred a broomstick! Literally, I shredded a broomstick once, it didn’t even slow down. They were tall so you had to climb on a ladder to reach the top, and they had a massive electric motor that spun a very heavy rotor very fast that would powder the documents. You threw multiple reams worth of paper at once.
    - 0cf8612b2e1e 3y ago
      It does seem a colossal failure that a potentially overrun location would not have the real industrial shredders and instead relies upon the consumer style.
      - Scoundreller 3y ago
        or you know, a small fireplace. Tehran sees cool enough overnight temperatures 8-9 months a year to even get some value from the heat.
    - NikkiA 3y ago
      Given this sample: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paper_shredder#/media/File:Shredded_1979-09-01_1305Z_CIA_cable_from_American_Embassy_Tehran.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paper_shredder#/media/File:Shr... It doesn't look like the embassy was even using a cross-cut shredder.
thekevan 3y ago
It depends on what you deem as a failure. We are talking buying something for about $13 US and reassembling it to theoretically up to about $17,600 US. Even if only, I don't know, 1/4 of the pieces are there, the potential to turn $13 into $4.5k isn't bad at all.
- lupire 3y ago
  Solving the puzzle in the computer doesn't reassemble the banknotes physically.
  - thekevan 3y ago
    Uh...correct. The computer tells you if it is possible. Isn't that the whole point of the exercise?
    - delichon 3y ago
      The point is making money according to the title.
- myself248 3y ago
  The limit of two souvenirs per visitor is interesting, perhaps they imagined someone would try this. The trick, then, is to collude with other souvenir purchasers, similar to McDonald's Monopoly, so you can quickly swap your own duplicate pieces to others who need them. But unlike Mcdonald's Monopoly, there's probably no rare Park Place that virtually guarantees an instant win to whoever holds it. The bank could do something like that. They could cut all the bills in two, and incinerate the left 60% of every single bill, so the souvenirs only contain shreds of the right 40%, thus guaranteeing that nobody can ever reconstruct 51% of a bill no matter how many souvenirs they have. But there seems to be no evidence that they're doing this.

araes 3y ago

While you might not be able to construct the entire banknote, there would probably be a high chance of many partial constructions. In and of itself interesting from a partially complete puzzle perspective. Plus, attempting to match varying serial numbers, dates, reference marks, while still having each bill vary. Could probably be improved by doing 50-100 variations on each bill to give a general idea of the patterns possible within a zone. Such as: This area has 8 possible characters, with 36 possible entries /[a-zA-Z0-9]/. It has a fixed border with some constant pattern nearby. Show all the possible combos and then dice up the area a bunch of different ways. On the partial constructions topic: You have 350 of 1000 pieces of an image with some known general shape. How much of the image can you reconstruct while still missing 2/3 of the pieces? At the least has applications for image guessing. Also, agree on the false bank note contents, and how many people at the note shredding office are just stuffing their pockets with bank notes and then filling the cylinders with rocks? Great scam that probably almost nobody actually checks.

CapitalistCartr 3y ago

The practical value here isn't in banknotes, it's in shredded classified documents. That's the elephant in the room. And it's good for advancing pure research.

nextaccountic 3y ago
Shredding seems the wrong tool if one wants to dispose classified documents Why not incinerating, dissolving in acid, grinding into a fine powder, or something like that?
- fifteen1506 3y ago
  Also questioned myself. My pet theory is big companies first shred and after send to be burned (or recycled). Plus a shredding machine us safer than a fire device.
  - flir 3y ago
    Cynically, if your insurance company says "4mm cross cut and a paper trail to prove it was done", then that's what you do. Why try harder? But yes, paper that's shredded by a specialist paper-shredding company is then typically baled up and sent for recycling.
- dools 3y ago
  I compost all of my sensitive information that arrives by mail. And whenever I need to dispose of something I can’t compost, like an old drivers license, I cut it into pieces and drip feed the pieces into the garbage over the course of a few months. Call me paranoid but I think there will be a cottage industry in sifting through garbage once this tech gets mature enough!
  - 0cf8612b2e1e 3y ago
    Considering all of my confidential information has already been leaked by some tech entity or another, yeah a bit paranoid. Concentrated data is juicier than mining trash.
  - KennyBlanken 3y ago
    Your trash bags are ripped open and co-mingled as they're sorted through by workers as it zips by on a conveyor belt. You're being very, very excessively paranoid doing anything more than just cutting it into a piece or two across the ID number.
  - shwaj 3y ago
    Lol! I do that with drivers licenses too. I laugh at myself as I do it.
  - 3y ago
lupire 3y ago
That's a different problem. In the banknote, case the document is known in advance.
- spitfire 3y ago
  Each banknote will have a unique serial number. So at least some part of the document will not be known in advance. Though serial numbers are well structured so you can take advantage of that.
bookofjoe 3y ago
>Seven Years After Embassy Seizure, Iran Still Prints U.S. Secrets https://www.nytimes.com/1986/07/10/world/7-years-after-embassy-seizure-iran-still-prints-us-secrets.html https://www.nytimes.com/1986/07/10/world/7-years-after-embas... https://archive.ph/EVbpX https://archive.ph/EVbpX >Among the most interesting papers are shredded secret documents pieced back together by the militants that detail attempts of the Central Intelligence Agency to recruit high-level Iranian officials, ayatollahs and exiles, foreign journalists and diplomats either as paid or ''unwitting'' agents in the months after the revolution in February 1979.
- ok_dad 3y ago
  I’m surprised they could put them back together. When I shredded top secret documents in the navy when I was a kid, what came out into the bin outside was effectively powder. Those shredders could shred a broomstick! Literally, I shredded a broomstick once, it didn’t even slow down. They were tall so you had to climb on a ladder to reach the top, and they had a massive electric motor that spun a very heavy rotor very fast that would powder the documents. You threw multiple reams worth of paper at once.
  - 0cf8612b2e1e 3y ago
    It does seem a colossal failure that a potentially overrun location would not have the real industrial shredders and instead relies upon the consumer style.
    - Scoundreller 3y ago
      or you know, a small fireplace. Tehran sees cool enough overnight temperatures 8-9 months a year to even get some value from the heat.
  - NikkiA 3y ago
    Given this sample: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paper_shredder#/media/File:Shredded_1979-09-01_1305Z_CIA_cable_from_American_Embassy_Tehran.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paper_shredder#/media/File:Shr... It doesn't look like the embassy was even using a cross-cut shredder.

thekevan 3y ago

It depends on what you deem as a failure. We are talking buying something for about $13 US and reassembling it to theoretically up to about $17,600 US. Even if only, I don't know, 1/4 of the pieces are there, the potential to turn $13 into $4.5k isn't bad at all.

lupire 3y ago
Solving the puzzle in the computer doesn't reassemble the banknotes physically.
- thekevan 3y ago
  Uh...correct. The computer tells you if it is possible. Isn't that the whole point of the exercise?
  - delichon 3y ago
    The point is making money according to the title.
myself248 3y ago
The limit of two souvenirs per visitor is interesting, perhaps they imagined someone would try this. The trick, then, is to collude with other souvenir purchasers, similar to McDonald's Monopoly, so you can quickly swap your own duplicate pieces to others who need them. But unlike Mcdonald's Monopoly, there's probably no rare Park Place that virtually guarantees an instant win to whoever holds it. The bank could do something like that. They could cut all the bills in two, and incinerate the left 60% of every single bill, so the souvenirs only contain shreds of the right 40%, thus guaranteeing that nobody can ever reconstruct 51% of a bill no matter how many souvenirs they have. But there seems to be no evidence that they're doing this.