For the young spies of tomorrow, it was a mission for your eyes only.
Today GCHQ released its devilish Christmas puzzle to test budding James Bonds.
The new head of intelligence, Anne Keast-Butler, has created the 'toughest Christmas challenge yet' for schoolchildren across the country.
Now GCHQ MailOnline has provided the answers to the tough questions.
The annual challenge is part of GCHQ's Christmas card featuring the agency's wartime home, Bletchley Park.
For the young spies of tomorrow, it was a mission for your eyes only. Today GCHQ released its devilish Christmas puzzle to test budding James Bonds
New intelligence chief Anne Keast-Butler has set the 'toughest Christmas challenge yet' for schoolchildren across the country
Aspiring spy students were asked to solve seven increasingly fiendish puzzles and riddles devised by GCHQ's in-house puzzlers.
Each of the questions has a one-word answer that can follow the word “Christmas.”
To discover the final festive answer, children had to look at the design on the front of the card, which features a rare 1940 image of a snow-covered Bletchley Park, taken before a photography ban was introduced at the manor.
The image was found in the personal family album of codebreaker Joan Wingfield, a talented cryptographer who worked on breaking Italian naval codes and who later married Arthur Bonsall, the seventh director of GCHQ.
The challenge was designed to test a range of problem-solving skills and high school students may have to work together to reveal the final festive message.
Ms Keast-Butler, the first woman to lead GCHQ, said it will test skills in code breaking, mathematics and analysis, all of which are part of the agency's secretive work.
'Puzzles have been at the heart of GCHQ from the start. These skills represent our historic roots in cryptography and encryption and remain important to our modern mission to keep the country safe,” she said.
To celebrate the new director's passion for maths, GCHQ has also released a bonus puzzle this year asking for sides
'The history of GCHQ at Bletchley Park is featured on this year's Christmas card as a reminder of the role this historic site played in our war effort, as well as as the home base for this year's AI Safety Summit.
'Our puzzlers have created a challenge designed for a mix of minds to solve. Whether you are an analyst, engineer or creative, there is a puzzle for everyone. This is one that classmates, family and friends must try to solve together.”
To celebrate the new director's passion for maths, GCHQ has also released a bonus puzzle asking for sides this year.
The architect of the quiz, known only as Colin, set up a final test for students to find a hidden word in his quote: 'Christmas is a great opportunity for GCHQ to engage young people, hence our annual Christmas Challenge.
'Our mission is aimed at helping people think differently and find inventive ways to tackle challenges.
'Like the work at GCHQ, solving the puzzles on the map requires a mix of minds, and we want to show young people that thinking differently is a gift.
'To read the final message, these different approaches must be brought together, demonstrating the value of teamwork as the final piece of the puzzle.
'With the Christmas Challenge we not only want to introduce young people to the way we work at GCHQ, but we also want it to be fun!'
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