Remember The Last Starfighter, where aliens used a video game as a recruitment tool for intergalactic fighter pilots? Apparently someone at GHCQ, a British government intelligence service that works with MI5 and MI6, remembers this 80s classic, because they’re using the same basic technique to recruit new intelligence agents, according to The Guardian. (It’s also possible someone at GHCQ is a fan of Stargate Universe and wants their own Eli Wallace, but that reference is less beloved than Starfighter.) If you go to http://www.canyoucrackit.co.uk/ and solve their cryptography puzzle, you too could be the next James Bond.
Prophetic
Well, assuming you were British. Because if you were, say, American and working for a foreign power, there’s a decent chance you’d technically be committing light treason. And maybe less James Bond, more the nerdy guy back in the home office yelling at Bond to cut the green wire over a cell phone. So, the Bond equivalent of Chloe from 24.
The code was created in an effort to recruit hackers. This is somewhat ironic, in that if you hack the answer, you are disqualified from a job in the civil service. And just for the record, because I tried typing these in, the answer is neither “I love bangers and mash” nor “Harry Potter rocks!” Try your hand at cracking the code, and let us know if you end up as a British super spy. Or don’t, if it means you’ll have to kill us after telling us.
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