As the UK nears the end of a year full of twists and surprise, the nation’s intelligence and security agency is keeping up tradition by releasing its annual Christmas card puzzle.
The GCHQ website says “the card is sent by our director Jeremy Fleming to colleagues and partners across the world”, but also invites members of the public to have a go at “one of our most fiendish puzzles to date”.
“Problem solving is at the heart of what we do,” said a spokesperson for the agency. “Taking on this Christmas cracker gives puzzlers an insight into the skills you need to be a GCHQ analyst.”
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Following last year’s snowflake sudoku, the 2020 challenge is in “the form of a bauble which contains a hidden message”, says The Telegraph. “Those attempting it will need to complete a series of letter sequences before plotting their answer from an enigmatic ‘frosty’ location.”
The only tip offered by GCHQ is to “bring together a mix of minds by sharing it with the wise men and women in your household to find the solution”.
But according to The Telegraph, “to find the solution, the wise will have to find the missing letter at the end of nine seemingly random sequences on the Christmas card, which shows a stylised bauble with an arrow running through it”.
The card instructs wannabe sleuths to: “Plot your single-letter answers in the corresponding golden nodes on the bauble. Follow the flow of arrows from somewhere frosty to unblock the message.”
The Telegraph has promised to reveal the answer on Saturday so that would-be sleuths can “see how close they have come to matching the code-cracking ability of Britain’s intelligence experts”.
-
Who owns Gaza? Israel's occupation plansThe Explainer Egypt, Israel and Britain have ruled the beleaguered territory
-
Savages: a tragi-comedy set in a 'quirky handcrafted world'The Week Recommends This new animated film by Oscar-nominated filmmaker Claude Barras is undeniably political, but it has a hopeful message
-
Why 'faceless bots' are interviewing job huntersIn The Spotlight Artificial intelligence is taking over a crucial part of recruitment
-
Is Henry Kissinger right about Ukraine?Speed Read The US statesman made a controversial speech at a virtual Davos appearance last week
-
Volodymyr Zelenskyy refused evacuation as Russian hitmen ‘parachuted’ into KyivSpeed Read Ukrainian president turned down opportunity to leave capital despite threat to life, adviser claims
-
America’s withdrawal from Afghanistan: a retreat into isolationism?Speed Read ‘In his selfish unilateralism’, Biden is no better than Trump, said The Daily Telegraph
-
The ‘heat dome’: blistering temperatures in the Pacific Northwest should act as a wake-up callSpeed Read People are used to hearing of record-high temperatures in desert states such as Nevada or Arizona, but not in verdant Washington and Oregon
-
Royal Marines ready to ‘disrupt and confuse’ enemiesSpeed Read Military chief says operating in area between peace and war could prevent all-out conflict
-
US Secret Service screening inauguration troops for riot sympathisersSpeed Read National Guard members under investigation as mob member claims GOP lawmakers aided Capitol siege
-
Plea for public to help find secret Second World War bunkersSpeed Read Hundreds of ‘Scallywag’ underground hideouts lie undiscovered in British countryside
-
What Boris Johnson has planned for his £16bn military spending spreeSpeed Read Space defence, cyber-offence and artificial intelligence to benefit from funding surge
