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Help! Last night my friends' new car was stolen!

I'm pretty sure it was one of the gangs that hang around here, and they've been a bit cocky. Where the car was parked, they spray-painted the following on the ground.

I'm sometimes the last gear, and sometimes the first

But I can't make head or tale of it, and nor can the police. Can you help?


So you found out who stole it, how about trying to find them?

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  • 5
    $\begingroup$ You did not just use Comic Sans. And JPEG artifacts too! Shocking. $\endgroup$
    – ArtOfCode
    May 9, 2017 at 16:54
  • 2
    $\begingroup$ Red herring. Now, the actual answer may be simply rotating a few of the letters to produce ALONE. $\endgroup$
    – Paag
    May 9, 2017 at 16:54
  • $\begingroup$ Nope. No rotation of letter or numbers - good idea though! $\endgroup$
    – CalvT
    May 9, 2017 at 16:55
  • $\begingroup$ Imgur doesn't seem to give anything actually $\endgroup$ May 9, 2017 at 16:56
  • $\begingroup$ @CalvT: Just saying, is any computer needed for the solution ? $\endgroup$
    – Paag
    May 9, 2017 at 16:56

1 Answer 1

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The gang who stole your friends' car are called

THE BAD LADZ

Thanks to @n_palum for helping in chat


If you

Type it into imgur reversed (The name of the image if you click edit is 'I'm sometimes the last gear, sometimes the first' and the last gear is the gear to REVERSE [Thanks @Techidiot]) you get the following: https://i.stack.imgur.com/3Z0LA.png


enter image description here

Text:

YnJvd3NlcnMud3RmL3B1enpsZS5odG1s

Using Base64 decoder (thanks @n_palum) you get the following website:

http://browsers.wtf/puzzle.html

(The console output is 32543 [Thanks @KritixiLithos] which is the OP's user ID)

Which has

the word 'Of'

The tab name is

Bottom

Giving

Bottom Of 32543

At the bottom of the OP's profile (at least at the time, may be removed in future) is a barcode

barcode

which decodes to

ZALD ABD ETH

which is an anagram of

THE BAD LADZ

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  • $\begingroup$ If you use a Base64 Decode you get this URL: browsers.wtf/puzzle.html $\endgroup$
    – n_plum
    May 9, 2017 at 17:07
  • $\begingroup$ If it is at all relevant, the console output is 32543 $\endgroup$
    – user41805
    May 9, 2017 at 17:10
  • $\begingroup$ @KritixiLithos is very relevant that is the OP's user ID $\endgroup$ May 9, 2017 at 17:14
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    $\begingroup$ This is one sophisticated gang $\endgroup$
    – ESR
    May 10, 2017 at 0:22
  • 1
    $\begingroup$ @EdmundReed And OP seems to be involved with them ... :D. $\endgroup$
    – user22015
    May 10, 2017 at 9:00

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