Question

Safe Combination. The author owns a safe in which he stores all of his great ideas for the
next edition of this book. The safe combination consists of four numbers between 0 and 99. If
another author breaks in and tries to steal these ideas, what is the probability that he or she will
get the correct combination on the first attempt? Assume that the numbers are randomly
selected. Given the number of possibilities, does it seem feasible to try opening the safe by
making random guesses for the combination?

Answer 1

Answer: 1/96059601

Don't break in

Step-by-step explanation:

First we need to find how many combinations there are.

We can find that by multiplying the four different number of options which in this case are all 99.

99 * 99 * 99 * 99

= 96059601

There are 96059601 different combinations and one correct combination.

So, the chance of them getting it is 1/96059601

It is definitely not a nice number so probably don't try and break in.