ARG or Serial Killer Confessions?

Hello ATS! This is my first thread, so please be gentle! I've done a search and I couldn't see this previously discussed, so here goes.

The title isn't an attention grabber, it's a genuine question. I've recently come across a channel that I'd like to share here, as it's filled with coded messages behind multiple ciphers that hints at something quite ghastly, and genuinely made me ask the question “could it actually be a serial killer looking for the recognition?”. However unlikely that may be, it's possible, and I love a puzzle.

Now, I know we're all pretty sick of intriguing mysteries that lead to a political stunt or viral advertising, so here's the twist; this rabbit hole gives, in code, the names of unsolved murder victims and missing persons from Colorado in the 80's and 90's and goes on to hint at clean up of bodies, but also goes further to elude the video maker is the one behind it.. and to date, it's 19 months old and counting, with a LOT still to be decoded.


To scratch the surface and wet the appetite, this 7 minute video does a short breakdown of decoded items from this channel with a focus around how the murder victims and missing people were coded into the videos. I'll bullet point it for those who can't watch it:



1. Channel found after a link was provided in code on a forum. Presumed the channel creator provided the coded link

2. The video titles began being decoded along with contents.

3. The 8th video titled “listen”, which showed a large field, contained code in the audio. When ran through a spectrograph, the name “Stephanie
Ann Bauman” appeared. She was found dead in a field in Colorado in 1980. She was believed to have been raped and chased through a field in the
snow, eventually dying of exposure. Unsolved

4. The 9th video titled “TWENTY FIVE” also contained an audio code. When run through a spectrograph, this combination appeared “ebsdz
boefstpo”. If you enter this into a Caesar Cipher and use “25” as the shift (from the video title), it decodes to “Darcy Anderson”, another murder
victim from Colorado in 1986.
1. SIDE NOTE: Interestingly, the “twenty five” video used an app which makes your videos look like VHS tape videos. The app also allows
you to set the date that appears. The creator chose 12/15/1986, Darcy's listed date of death was 12/22/1986. Is the creator trying to say
something? Like actual DoD?

5. THIS IS NO LONGER AVAILABLE: For a brief time the channel had a hex code description with a set of co-ordinance, which led to a stacked cipher
and murder victim number 3:

1. Decoded hex description showed a jumble of letters. The co-ords led to a field in Colorado
2. The jumble of letters was eventually found to be a Vigenere cipher. The field in Colorado was next to Curtis St, so Curtis was used as the key
for the Vigenere cipher, which yielded another string of random letters.
3. That string was run through an Atbash decoder, which yielded “Karen Denise Aguilera”, a murder victim from 1988 in, you
guessed it, Colorado.

6. The 12th Video with a hex code title; The decoded title was a link to a picture from a previous video (picture of what looks like an organ on a
plastic sheet with lots of blood) with another code superimposed on top. That code led to an audio file, which in a spectrogram contained the
name “Edith Bernice Lehnerz”, a missing person from Colorado since 1995.

7. The 13th Video coded title translates to “I loved them all”


So 3 murder victims and a missing person all from Colorado, all unsolved, all hidden beneath code that wants to be found, followed by “I loved them all”... And that's only up to video 13 out of 35, a lot of which still have not been decoded.

If this hasn't grabbed your interest then there's only one thing I'd ask of you; Are the below symbols familiar to you at all? (I couldn't embed the image, sorry =( ). They are from the most recent video a month ago.





For anyone else whose interested, I'll proceed on to breakdown what's thought to have been decoded so far and what's left unsolved, but first the channel in question and some detail. It's called “deeper”:

The Channel

The Deeper Channel

The videos started in May 2016, with a bulk of them being uploaded on the 20th and are all very, very short videos. Some had coded descriptions, but it seems the uploader went back and added a number to the video descriptions to indicate a numerical order that conflicts with the chronological posting order, although apparently some videos were deleted, so that could be why the numbering came to be.

All the videos are intentionally creepy with most of the creepy music coming from Daniel Johnson.


DECODING

So far there has been Vigenere, Caesar, Atbash, Base 64, Hex, Audio codes, Latin, and most recently some unknown symbols. There's sites easily available to decode most of these, however I'm still struggling to get a decent spectrogram software. Keep these in mind when trying to decode the videos.

A lot of titles have been decoded however there is still many remaining, and there is still more in the video themselves to be interpreted and understood, further than just the titles alone, and further than analyzing the video as a singular rather than a collective meaning.

For me, I'd love to get to the bottom of the message being delivered here, for the sole reason that it utilizes actual murdered and missing people, all unsolved. If you want to join in, I'll break down each video one by one now in the next post while I continue with these (only up to video 013).

I glanced through and when I saw you say the 13th video out of 35 I stopped reading, I don`t do youtube videos and I sure as hell don`t do 35 of hem lol

VIDEO BREAKDOWNS

If you pick a vid and analyze it, could you please give us a summary in the below fashion so that I can easily add it to the list? And maybe call out which vid you're looking into, so that we can tackle multiple at once.

Here's a breakdown of the videos I've got through so far:

Video 000: Unknown.

Title: a r o u n d
Code: No code is evident in this one, at least not that I can see.
Content: A ceiling fan slowly turning. That's it..
Status: UNKNOWN. With no evident code or symbology, perhaps the decoded titles and plain titles tell a story when the order is correct, so I'll add that and see where it goes.


Video 001: DECODED - “they follow”

Title: 73 65 63 75 74 69 20 73 75 6e 74
Code: Title is Hex – Converts to Latin “securi” which roughly translates to “they follow” or “follow”
Content: First person angle of someone running down a street. Then stops, and begins to zoom on something, just as the video ends. This same street is in a later video also..
Status: DECODED. The title seems to be the only code in this video, so I'll keep that in the memory bank to see if the titles themselves tell a story.

If we swap the title order around to the order of the upload, it would be “followed around”. I'll do an upload order title string at the end, since it skips around a bit.


Video 002: DECODED - “the stalk”

Title: “culmus”
Code: Appears to be Latin, rough translation is “the stalk”?
Content: Another fan, this time a different type. Focuses on the fan until it sounds like a door opening, then the camera quickly jerks and the video ends.
Status: DECODED. The only visible thing here is again the title. The fan imagery could also have some meaning, since it's repeated now.


Video 003: NO CODE

Title: “here”
Code: No apparent code.
Content: An open field, appears to be in the middle of nowhere, showing some hills in the background.
Status: UNKNOWN. In the comments someone has provided the following co-ordinates where they think this is. It does look similar, but here you go: - 34.84119, -100.42861. This place itself must have some significance, but what?


Video 004: DECODED - “alarmed”

Title: “bshlk”
Code: The title is a Vigenere cipher with the key word “pooryou” from the song title in the background. The cipher gives “metum”, which translates from Latin to English as “alarmed” or similar.
Content: A smashed lightbulb, rolling side to side on a hard surface. For the first time we start getting audio. The song is “Poor you” by Daniel Johnson.
Status: DECODED


Video 005: UNKNOWN

Title: “kypw 'ixlavz”
Code: So far this has not been decoded. A mention that it's a caesar cipher in the comments, and using the number 2 will show the first string is “mary” however the second string remains a mystery.
Content: A revolver on a table. I do not know the model number or name.
Status: UNKNOWN. Potentially the model name of the gun could be the key for a vigenere cipher, or the model numbers could be separate caesar's for the first and second word.


Video 006: DECODED - “end”

Title: “finem”
Code: Latin Title = “end”. Unknown any other relevance
Content: A 0:11 video showing darkness and sounds like someone falling down the stairs while the song “push joe around” plays in the background.
Status: DECODED


Video 007: UNKNOWN

Title: “drop”
Code: Apparently none. There's no audio, no cryptic title or description. So that leaves the content itself.
Content: An 0:08 video of a long drain pipe in a concrete area.
Status: UNKNOWN. The drain in the video must have relevance somehow. It might make sense when put together with other titles and factor in the content after..
Chronological Title String: “Around” “Followed” “the stalk” “here” “alarmed” (unknown) “end” “drop”


Video 008: DECODED - “Stephanie Ann Bauman” - First Murder Victim mentioned


Title: “l i s t e n”
Code: Audio code at the end and when run through a spectrograph, it gives the name “stepanie ann bauman” - she was a 15 year old who was raped and chased naked through the snow until she was left to die in 1980 in Colorado.
Content: A 0:27 video showing a field. That's pretty much it. Could possibly be the field that Stephanie was left in.
Status: DECODED. The field in the clip and it's relevance is still not confirmed.
Chronological Title String: “Around” “Followed” “the stalk” “here” “alarmed” (unknown) “end” “drop” “listen”


Video 009: DECODED - “Darcy Anderson” - Second Murder Victim mentioned

Title: “TWENTY FIVE”
Code: Multiple. If you run the audio through a spectrograph, you get “ebsdz boefstpo”. If you use the video title “25” as the key to a caesar cipher, “ebsdz boefstpo” becomes Darcy Anderson, another murder victim from Colorado from 1986. Interestingly, in this video he/she has used the app to make the film look older. On that app you can set the date and time you want to appear. This person chose 12/15/1986, Darcy's listed date of death is 12/22/1986..
Content: 0:08 Looking down a hallway, then walking down it. The only audio is the audio code.
Status: DECODED. The house is unknown.
Chronological Title String: “Around” “Followed” “the stalk” “here” “alarmed” (unknown) “end” “drop” “listen” “twenty five”


Video 010: DECODED - “dead”

Title: “mortem”
Code: Latin title
Content: 0:16 of what looks like an organ and blood on a large plastic sheet inside of a partially build house/complex
Status: DECODED. The title “dead” with the imagery of an organ and blood on a sheet in a half built house


Video 011: UNKNOWN - “s e l f”

Title: “s e l f”
Code: Latin title
Content: 0:39 of the moon, what looks like a field at night
Status: UNKNOWN


Video 012: DECODED - “Edith Bernice Lehnerz” - First Missing Person

Title: 68 74 74 70 3a 2f 2f 69 2e 69 6d 67 75 72 2e 63 6f 6d 2f 52 69 4f 6c 44 6e 48 2e 70 6e 67
Code: Hex title led to an image file with another hex, that led to an audio file which when run through a spectrogram, had Edith's name
Content: 0:18 closeup of water lapping over a manufactured surface, small scale
Status: DECODED


Video 013: DECODED - “I loved them all”

Title: n lbaeq fly tf gmez
Code: Vigenere cipher using “fan” as the key
Content: 0:13 of a spinning ceiling fan, again.
Status: DECODED


(more to come). Please post yours and I'll add them to the above!

a reply to: bluechevytree

They're all about 10 to 20 seconds each, but I get ya, it's a lot of individual vids to go through.

I dont even know where to start with this one...creepy

Has anyone tried tracking tge ip

a reply to: Ghostsinthefog

I don't think so, from what I can tell at least. It's only gone as far as decoding a few of the vids.

Without digging into any of this... and only reading what you have provided. My superficial assumption is that they are implying the killed victims... they were "fans" that followed the killer or someone or something around. The killer or someone loved them all ?

If I find time I may look into this more. Even though the feelings of this thread gave me a feeling of dread... due to revolving around unsolved murders.

Those symbols look alchemical and astronomical in nature. & If true, there could be elements of sacrificial crap.

Either someone has made a game out of unsolved murders and it could be totally unrelated to the serial killings but being used as a platform or the killer is getting a kick out of reviving their dirty deeds. Both are kinda disturbing, but is that not what attracts folks to a mystery.

leolady

I actually just want to bump this because i dont think it got the ats members attention and i think it deserves it.

I dug around today, didnt figure much of anything out.

But as of students doing an art project...it would be very dark to make codes which represent missibg women

a reply to: Ghostsinthefog

I know! What the hell? Donald Trump.. well.. Trumps, and it's straight to the top of the front page with 300 replies.. something like this that is genuinely interesting and possibly even pretty serious gets about 10 replies
Where's all the folks who keep making threads about the 'old ATS'?

Insane...

Anyhoo... I wish I had the first clue about codes and codebreaking. I'd be all over this... sadly I haven't the foggiest where to even start.. just commenting to flag the thread really and hoping that someone a lot smarter than me comes along to add something substantial..

Anyway, great job bringing this to our attention OP... Interesting stuff. Thanks

a reply to: Indrasweb

Same here. The whole premise behind these videos is intriguing and I'm useless at cryptic puzzles.

It's also an incredibly dark premise. The uploader seems to have an obsession with the deaths of the girls and that's not a good thing. That they might be somehow involved is an even bleaker prospect. Another angle is how drawing people in for entertainment based on a string of murders is negative. It's exploitative to a degree.

If the uploader was involved the leads and clues would eventually become deflective. Then again there have been a few killers in recent history who sought attention so much they courted publicity and were caught. It's a crazy enough world where anything can happen.

Is there anyway the uploader can be tracked through youtube or by their online csrbon footprint? Whst thr ciphers interest the fbi maybe?

This has the potential to be the digital zodiac.

However my question is that those videos are old. Why upload them now? And back then who had the know how to create ciphar codes using sound??? That has to be unique to certain people, as back then you didnt have the internet to do it for you

Im going to try and contact the user

Thought I would add some info about the murder victims/missing people.

15-year-old girl stripped, dies of exposure

Victim’s name: Stephanie Bauman, 15
Location body found: County Road 173 near U.S. 36
Investigative agency: Arapahoe County Sheriff’s Office
Date killed: Oct. 28, 1980
Cause of Death: Hypothermia
Suspect: None identified
The last hours of 15-year-old runaway Stephanie Ann Bauman’s life were hellish. Someone or a group of people apparently forced her to disrobe in sub-freezing temperatures on Oct. 28, 1980 near a windmill in rural Arapahoe County. She may have been beaten and sexually assaulted.

At some point, she ran barefoot and nude down a trail and on a dirt road for four miles in a desperate attempt to escape her tormentor.

There was evidence she was followed by a car filled with as many as five people who harassed her and prevented her from seeking help. Exhausted, she fell in a ditch and froze to death after wandering in circles.

She was found in a rural area near the town of Byers, CO about 40 miles east of Denver. There's more at the link. Very strange story.


Darcie Anderson, 24, found 12/22/1986.
Mother of 6-year-old boy abducted, stuffed in trunk

The body of the 24-year-old single Castle Rock woman had been discovered found six days after she disappeared and failed to show up for the two jobs she worked to take care of her young son, according to a story by former Denver Post reporter Steve Garnass.

She had been kidnapped some time either on the night of Dec. 16 or the morning of Dec. 17, strangled and abandoned in her car on a muddy alley on the 1900 block of South Bannock Street in Denver. Her body was discovered on Dec. 22. Bruises indicated that she had been beaten, but no indication was found at the time that she had been sexually assaulted.

More at the link. Her body was discovered about 45 miles from where Stephanie Bauman was found. It's damn near a straight shot from one location to the other. Very tragic story, her son was left alone at the house after her abduction. There's a Wyoming connection, an old boyfriend. In the comments section of one of the videos someone mentioned Wyoming.


Karen Denise Aguilera

Karen D. Aguilera, a 23 year old, was last seen on September 17, 1987. On May 10, 1988, her body was found in a field near Curtis Road and Falcon Highway.

She was found about 10 miles east of I-25 in Colorado Springs.


Edith Bernice Lehnerz

On November 17, 1995, 38 year old Edith Bernice Lehnerz was supposed to arrive at the home of a friend and never did. When she did not arrive, her family members reported her missing. Ms. Lehnerz has a medical condition involving her heart and was on medication. She had just given birth to a child prior to her disappearance, and was last seen wearing pinkish clear round glasses.

Last seen in Colorado Springs.

Found a couple more here www.reddit.com...

Kara Nichols
Colorado Springs lingerie model vanishes on photo shoot trip to Denver

Nichols, 19, lived in a small Colorado Springs home with three men she was renting a room from. Two of the men, who were in their mid to late 20s and worked on road construction crews, were on a trip out of town. Tara told the youngest of her roommates that a girlfriend was going to pick her up for the modeling gig.

Minutes later he saw a dark sedan pulling away from the home and assumed that Kara’s ride had arrived.

That was on Oct. 9, 2012. Kara has not been seen since then. Investigators suspect someone posing as a photographer may have harmed her.

More at the link.


Patricia Ann Cordova

On February 16, 2005, 47 year old Patricia Cordova was last seen between the late evening and night hours leaving a family member's residence in the vicinity of the 5000 block of Clay Street in Westminster, CO. Ms. Cordova was reportedly headed to the local store.

Westminster is 13 miles north of Denver just west of I-25.

This is whole thing is really creepy. I found it especially interesting since I'm in CO. I'm way down south though, pretty far from all the locations.

I've been looking at symbols. Some surveyor's marks look similar. I wonder if they might point to locations. A large circle with a dot in the center can be a symbol for the sun. I found a native american symbol that looks a bit like the half circle/arch symbol, it meant "something hidden." The diagonal line with the dot could be something on an incline/mountainside, just guessing.

I can't help with the ciphers, the poster on reddit said morse code was found within the spectrograph on one of the more recent videos. On the video titled "relapse" at the very end is an imagine of handcuffed hands. There's glass or debris of some kind on the floor, possible shell casings or glass? On another video, the one with all the copper piping there's a date September 10, 2009.

From what I gather the FBI has been contacted. I will keep digging. Some think it's just a twisted game but I'm not so sure.

Sorry, I've been away for a while. Hate to necro threads but now that I'm back I'm hoping to breathe life into this again.

Completely agree with the above about this being a very dark premise for a casual ARG or prank, and it's been well over a year and still going with really not much attention. To me that breaks the mold when it comes to arty projects or ARG.

(I'm not yet familiar with quoting multiple people in a reply so please bare with me!)

MorningGlory: Thank you for the breakdown of the named victims so far! There's still one more video with audio coded text that I'll breakdown tonight and post up.

One thing of note; Most of the missing/murdered women are from back in the 80's and 90's, however Kara Nichols went missing in 2012. That's relatively recent compared to the others, especially considering the title of the video is "Again".

This is the video mentioning Kara Nichols: (LANGUAGE WARNING!!!: This clip has audio of Jim Morrison reciting a poem. There's strong language in there, so discretion advised):



Decoding: Hex title decodes to ITERUM, latin for "Again". Kara's name is hidden in the audio that you hear at the end. Thanks to comments on the video for doing the leg work on this one.

Considering how recent this disappearance is, I'd really like to get these symbols translated. There's more symbols hidden in audio which seem to match the same style as these. Hoping if we can crack where these symbols are from then I can decode the others.

originally posted by: Ghostsinthefog
Is there anyway the uploader can be tracked through youtube or by their online csrbon footprint? Whst thr ciphers interest the fbi maybe?

This has the potential to be the digital zodiac.

However my question is that those videos are old. Why upload them now? And back then who had the know how to create ciphar codes using sound??? That has to be unique to certain people, as back then you didnt have the internet to do it for you

That's the thing; I don't think these videos are that old. There's an app you can use to make the recording seem like old VHS. You can even enter the date that you want to appear on it. I think that's why the videos naming the women from the 80's and 90's don't have what would appear to be their bodies etc, because it wasn't filmed. There's just clues. Almost like someone who has gotten away with it and wants to feel the satisfaction of being talked about after all that time.

All except for the video mentioning Kara.. That one is intentionally gruesome.

Looks like I lost the time window for editing, so I can't update the second post with more breakdowns. I'll have to do them here as well as a little summary at the end of what the whole story (with missing parts) seems to tell.

Video 014: DECODED - “Perpetuate”


Title: xqzhwriubq
Code: Vigenere cipher using “imissyou” as the key
Content: 0:16 of a small creek, looks to be plastic stuck on some of the branches on the side.
Status: Title DECODED only

Video 015: UNKNOWN


Title: r e l a p s e
Code: No apparent code in this one. Again that leaves the content and the title.
Content: 0:36 of him walking through perhaps a field at night. Shows a couple of trees and what appears to be factory lights? At the very end, around 0:35 mark, is two hands behind someones back, handcuffed. Only appears for a second, if that.
Status: UNKNOWN


The video numbering gets weird from here on in. There's a lot of gaps in the numbering, and large jumps up into the hundreds. Here's what I think is actually video 16:

Video 166: DECODED - “Desolation”


Title: 64 65 73 6f 6c 61 74 69 6f 6e

Code: Hex Title translates to “Desolation”. There's no other visible codes, however the audio is what sounds like a German number station.
Content: 02:45 of the same area/field that appears in 014 and 017. There is multiple split second splices placed into this video. Of them, the only one that appears to show anything is the last one. It's a concrete or metal bunker. The hint here seems to be that the bunker is in this field somewhere, but no idea where this field is:




Status: itle DECODED only


Video 017: DECODED - “closer”


Title: proxior
Code: Just latin title. Couldn't see any other codes
Content: 0:11 of what looks like the same location as video 014. Shows a dirt road/track, that's it. Looks like the same white plastic or paper is on the dirt road. The surrounding foliage looks very close to vid 014
Status: Title DECODED only


Video 028: UNKNOWN - Still can't break this code.


Title: lb'k ccl symj
Code: For the life of me I can't break this one. I've tried different methods and different cipher orders but to no avail. I believe it's a Cryptogram but the only partly legible results I get is “he'd” at the start. The other option is a Vigenere Cipher but the key word is needed.
Typically in previous videos the key word is hidden within the video somewhere.
Content: 0:13 of a fan or garbage disposal or something. Can't really identify what this is, but whatever it is, it could be the key to a Vigenere Cipher that would decode the title.
Status: UNKNOWN


There's more to come. At least another 3 victims are coded into later videos. I'll get to those soon but there's still videos I've listed so far that have not been decoded yet. I'll crack those open again before I get to the later videos.

At this point I'll try to summarise what's appeared in the videos in somewhat of a storyline:

1. The videos start with what seems like just titles to take note of, part of a story, about following and stalking.
2. Next the names of the first few victims are coded in
3. Then scenery videos, showing some place of relevance to the victims; either where they were found or where they disappeared (some still to be found, and this is why I'd love to track down these scenery locations)
4. After that, some of the videos become more bloody and gory, like Mortem and Again, showing what looks to be internal organs and some sort of raw meat porridge (I gagged a little typing that)
5. Then we see videos of barrels of Sulfuric Acid, a plastic sheet covered basement or enclosed structure, a body under a sheet, cleaning products, and a few more locations, including a bunker.
6. More victims names appear in the later videos

In a nutshell; stalk, catch, kill, melt with acid, pour into drain pipe or dump in field. Rinse and repeat.



HINTS FOR DECODING: The codes are quite simple generally so here's a little how-to for them:

1. Caesar Cipher: Basically every letter is consistently offset by a number of letters. E.g. A Caesar Cipher with an offset of 2 means that A becomes C, B becomes D and so forth. Probably one of the easiest to decode since there's only 25 options and you can use online decoders to smash through those pretty quick. Becomes more difficult when it's stacked with other ciphers or each word has it's own. Typically in these videos the key is provided, but hidden. Will usually look like a jumble of letters that don't make sense.

2. Vigenere Cipher: Similar to Caesar but each letter is offset uniquely of the others. These will have passphrases, and the letters in the passphrase dictate the offset of each letter in the coded message. Again in these videos, the passphrase is provided but well hidden. Will usually look like a jumble of letters that don't make sense.

3. Base64: Probably the most familiar to people by name at least. In these videos, it's usually used in conjunction with other ciphers (also in these videos, Base64 code will usually end with "=" or "==".

4. Atbash Cipher: Basically a mirror cipher. A = Z, B = Y, C = X, etc etc.

5. Hexidecimal: Probably the easiest to detect visually. A typical alphanumeric string, commonly spaced every 2 characters.

6. Spectrograph: These are the weird tones you hear in the audio. Run the audio through a spectrograph and you'll see letters.

It becomes more difficult when multiple ciphers are stacked on top of each other, which has been the case in some of the videos that named the victims. E.g. Spectrogram result was a Vigenere Cipher, that when decoded provided an Atbash cipher. There's decoders for all mentioned above and more. So far I'm only using these but I'm getting to the point where I'll look at ROT13 variations or Gronsfeld version of a Vigenere.

Hope that helped a little! I'm not great on the old ciphers myself so hoping there's a resident much more proficient in it.


I'll try to solve some of the earlier videos before I get cracking on the later ones. Any help would be great!

a reply to: Kostafa


Hey! Are you Still at it? I can join if you need Company. We can solve this crazy thingy together.

a reply to: Kostafa

In the comments of "lb'k ccl symj" someone used the keyword "Garbage disposal" and he get "It's not over"