A cryptography mystery on Reddit, could it point towards The Riddler being in The Dark Knight Rises?

[GrandWino]

An interesting AskReddit post from yesterday involving an incredible tale of a homeless man handing a person a $50 bill on the subway along with a note that had an encrypted message. Redditors crack the code and the mystery deepens from there.

I’m 99% sure the homeless guy story is false, but it sounds like an ingenious marketing campaign for TDK, and could point towards The Riddler being in the film.

Here is a summary of what has been found so far:

1. The original message is decrypted as: There’s plenty more money to make figure this out and prepare to meet july 19 fifty sixth and sixth hot dog stand outside rue57 cafe ask for mister input

2. The follow up message is decrypted as: YOU HAVE MANAGED TO FIND THE MESSAGE WITH THE HELP OF FRIENDS. YOU CHANGED THE RULES NOW SO WILL I. JULY TWELVE FOUR PM. FIND THE BLUE JAY AT SIX AND A HALF AND FIFTY SIXTH AND TELL HIM YOU ARE THE LAST.

3. new_b has translated the username of “hoboman” into an IP address. It’s from the US Department of Defense.

4. Cardnumber47582 discovered what might be “Blue Jay”

5. As /u/jrm2003 and others have said, the code on the $50 bill is a UNIX timecode for July 19, 12:00pm EST.

6. Not sure if relevant, but fun nonetheless: /u/Ca11megee found out that the sum of mister input’s username is 42.

Not sure if this is TDK related or not, but the dates involved in the messages and some other details brought up in the comments section seem to point that way. In any case, I enjoy a good mystery even if the entire thing is a put-on, and figure it would be pretty interesting to many here as well.

[GrandWino]

Hm, seems more likely to be marketing for a new Spy exhibit in NYC. Oh well, the Riddler hopes were fun while they lasted.

[Pushkin]

@Bob Ducca

Oh well, the Riddler hopes were fun while they lasted.

Fun, so it couldn’t possibly be in one of the Nolan Batman films.

[Swords_to_Plowshares]

Yep, most likely viral marketing for the sky exhibit.

[tellyworth]

The IP address clue is based on flawed assumptions, and is almost certainly meaningless. Pick any integer, translate it to an IP address, and there’s about a 1 in 20 chance that it’s military.

[GrandWino]

@tellyworth

The IP address clue is based on flawed assumptions, and is almost certainly meaningless. Pick any integer, translate it to an IP address, and there’s about a 1 in 20 chance that it’s military.

Turns out that number was actually the OP’s phone # backwards.