GKNOVA6 began last month when several video game websites and CoD community members recieved a mysterious package in the mail. Inside the package was a USB storage device with a text file and an audio file. The text file had six words: Cryptography, Isotope, Philanthropy, Hydrogen, Ember, and Rebirth. If you take the first letter of each word, it spells "cipher." The audio file begins with a male voice saying, "What we wish, we readily believe, and what we ourselves think, we imagine others think also." Then a female voice says, "M O D (3 chimes) Z Z Z J N Q R Y D 3 F R P." The first part was a quote from Julius Caesar, and means that you need to use the Caesar cipher to decode the message. The Caesar cipher is a substitution cipher where you replace each letter in a message with one that is a ceratin number of positions down the alphabet. The female voice saying "M O D" with 3 chimes indicates to shift each letter 3 times. When "Z Z Z J N Q R Y D 3 F R P" is shifted back 3 times, it becomes "W W W G K N O V A 6 C O M." That led to
http://www.gknova6.com, which is a very strange website that contains nothing but an old style television. On the right side of the television there are five lights that, when clicked on, play an encrypted transmission.
The first transmission begins with another quote: "Men have sought to make a world from their own conception and to draw from their own minds all the material which they employed." Then the woman says "M O D (2 chimes)." After that "NOVASIX" is spelled several times, by both the male and the female voice. The quote was from Francis Bacon, so this time a Baconian cipher must be used. Near the end of the transmission a voice says "Hell is Purple." That leads to purplehell.com, a site that can be used to decode the message. The two chimes indicate to use the second form of the Baconian cipher. Using purplehell.com's decrypter, the message can be decoded to "APRIL WEEK TWO," which is when the second transmission became available.
The second transmission starts with "On the Lower Rhine and in Westphalia he commanded for the league." Then "M O D 1 9 6 9 D U G B T R L R F M - G W O X A W D N S N O C - Y X N M." The quote is of Count Gronsfeld, so a Gronsfeld cipher is used. Using 1969 as the key to the cipher, it comes out to "C L A S S I F I E D - A N N O U N C E M E N T - S O M D." An announcement was found on somd.com which read:
NOVA Posted by: Eve Reign on Friday, 9 April 2010, at 3:20 p.m. LWLXRMSYWN.GVVOXXPXBVOKTPXAVSFTMBK -AONTHLRDOF.DHXSWEJHCQSQFWTCZUBCAM LWLXRMSYWN.LRDOFUINENYMGNPBMSYWNHAM, -YFTTXEWPGJL.XVORLUINEASPTCZUBJWGILVF LWLXRBGG.CCGRNYMGNAEMOWXAAGMSYWNGVVO, -GCYSRZYKXR.YBCBGCYGVVOXDOKSWEJUINE LWLXRMSYWN.XVORLCCGRAONTHLVFCWKYG, -FMFWCMXIMX.RTLHGPBWTMBKNSNTZBIM XXPXSQFW.HYORVPAKYHAMCAMMBKAONTH, MUZOWHYORV.CAMIGRAONTHLRDOFHYORVOAVBM
You can find me at the Cheeping River. It’s near the Cheering Viper.
An anagram for Eve Reign, Cheering Viper, and Cheeping River is Vigenere and Vigenere Cipher. Sputnik, the key for the cipher, was found in the frequency analysis of the transmission. The message came out to:
THREEEIGHT.NINEFIVEONESEVENNINESIX -SEVENSEVEN.ONEFOURSIXFIVEEIGHTSIX THREEEIGHT.SEVENFOURFOURTWOEIGHTONE, -ONEZEROFOUR.EIGHTFOURSIXEIGHTZEROSIX THREETWO.NINEFOURTHREEEIGHTEIGHTNINE, -ONEZEROSIX.FOURONENINEFOURFOURFOUR THREEEIGHT.EIGHTNINESEVENSIXSEVEN, -SEVENSEVEN.ZEROTHREESIXFIVEFIVE FIVEFIVE.SEVENFIVEONESIXSIXSEVEN, THREESEVEN.SIXONESEVENSEVENSEVENEIGHT
These are the coordinates for five different places - CIA headquarters, NORAD, White Sands, the White House, and Kremlin.
The third transmission is as follows: "They used the Earth's magnetic field x the information was gathered and transmitted. M O D (4 chimes) 10 21 26 1 26 19 - 25 16 22 2 20 1 21 23 16 26 22 19 3" The quote is from the Kryptos and the 4 chimes mean to use the 4th tableau of the Kryptos' transcript. Once decrypted the message is "U S E N E T - D R A G O N S B R E A T H" This leads to a Google Groups post:
NOVA TRUTHSEEKERS I want this story told. This is the tip of the iceberg. Tell All But Ultraviolet November. Send All Relevant Items Now. Situation Offers Many Appropriate Nights. we’ll have a GAS. The elements are in the sounds and words. Look and listen. -DRAGONSBREATH
By taking first letters, you get tabun, soman, and sarin, which are all nerve gases. The next part of the transmission says "Nothing in life is to be feared it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more so that we may fear less. M O D 1 0 0 (several different tones) Outside of consciousness there lies the cold and alien world of actual things. M O D - Can't you see the whole spectrum? Kenneth, what's the frequency? Linear not Algorithmic." The first quote is from Marie Curie, and the second quote was from Heinrich Hertz. The frequencies of the tones are: 200, 800, 1800, 3200, 2400, 800, 200 then 200, 800,1800, 3200, 2100, 900, 200. M O D 1 0 0 indicates to divide these numbers by 100, and that comes out to be 2, 8, 18, 32, 24, 8, 2 and 2, 8, 18, 32, 21, 9, 2. These are the electron configurations of Plutonium and Uranium, respectively. Also, a frequency analysis on this transmission revealed "5+5=10 FREEDOM=7 5+5=10." It is believed that this is referring to the Freedom 7 launch on May 5th, 1961, or May 5th 2010.
In the 4th transmission, a voice states "Azure has the task" three times. Nova Six also posted again on the Google Groups page:
Azure: Since you have provided us with this information, we give you a new task, and see if you can deliver. We are looking for a specific document, one that we would very much like to find. This document is posted by someone who remains just out of our reach…for now. We have intercepted communications with a code that we haven’t been able to crack. Post this document in a public place, and we will correspond again in the future. Transmission is as follows: They came in a black helicopter to try and aid the dead president. Even the cabal could not stop the spy. An interesting Conspiracy, one the world would not soon forget, had they ever known.
Another Google Group was found that had four extra lines that, when rearranged, say "May all servants of nihilism / build the cornerstone of our / house in brick, stone, marble, and granite, to keep them at bay. But remember the / freezing point is in error, I question if it's one degree higher." This group also had downloadable files, but they needed a password to open. Each of the four parts was a clue to the password, "MASON." When opened, the file says:
TOP SECRET July 21, 1961 Memorandum for: director (_) SUBJECT: Transmissions from a suspected numbers station near the (_) embassy containing alarming and cryptic references. Research appears to be underway involving variants of Tabun, Sarin, Soman, and an unknown gas if possibly far greater potential for devastation. Every member of the S.O.G. team in the field should be briefed. Yesterday, a new transmission involving Plutonium and Uranium was also intercepted but was lost before the transmission comlpleted. All foreign agents listening to numbers stations should be vigilant to these keywords. Recent chatter has reached a fever pitch. CIA operatives have been assigned to the program, and additional support is requested. Have all reports forwarded to the White House, and present in an Interim review no later than July 31, 1961. John F. Kennedy
Starting after 'Subject,' if you take the first letters from each sentence it spells out "TREYARCH," which seems to be confirmation that this is for Call of Duty: Black Ops.