[Original writeup](http://quangntenemy.blogspot.com/2014/03/ructf-quals-2014.html)
This is a very famous image. By finding and comparing it with the original image it can be concluded that there is no information hidden visually. Analysis with Caesum's StegSolve brought me to the conclusion that the only place to hide the flag is inside the palette. It is also suspicious to see only 14 colors used for the image while the palette contains 256 colors with a lot of repetition.
![nyan-palette.png](http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-kc7L5RZuCE4/Ux3UzmbRsuI/AAAAAAAAAIE/ej6RDIKLSAs/s1600/nyan-palette.png)
After extracting the palette I found out that this is actually a DataMatrix barcode (thanks stypr). The rest is easy. The hidden text is `u.to/P4JUBg`, which is a link to the flag: `RUCTF_ca8250c2b4b50581afc9ffd1f403f3f2`