GCHQ Releases 'Hardest Ever' Christmas Puzzle

Over 1,000 Schools Registered for the Challenge Aimed at Inspiring STEM Studies

GCHQ, the UK's intelligence and cyber agency, has released its annual Christmas puzzle, described as the 'hardest ever', aimed at secondary school children and the public.
The puzzle consists of seven increasingly complex tasks that reveal a festive message once solved, testing skills such as codebreaking, maths, analysis, and lateral thinking.
More than 1,000 schools have registered in advance for the challenge, which is in its third year and aims to inspire young people to study STEM subjects.
The Christmas card featuring the challenge also includes a rare image of the agency's wartime home at Bletchley Park, taken in January 1940.
The answers to the puzzles will be available on GCHQ’s website at 7 a.m. local time (2 a.m. ET) Friday.