gHacks technology news » password recovery http://www.ghacks.net A technology blog covering software, mobile phones, gadgets, security, the Internet and other relevant areas. Tue, 24 Nov 2009 23:31:44 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.6 en hourly 1 GPU Password Recovery For Rar Archives http://www.ghacks.net/2009/09/05/gpu-password-recovery-for-rar-archives/ http://www.ghacks.net/2009/09/05/gpu-password-recovery-for-rar-archives/#comments Sat, 05 Sep 2009 15:07:20 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=16048 microsoft windowsThe latest video card generation that is manufactured by ATI and Nvidia can be used to speed up password recovery attempts tremendously. Toolkits like Nvidia’s CUDA offer drivers and development examples to aid developer’s in the integration of gpu accelerated password recovery programs. One of the programs that is making use of the gpu to recover passwords is Rar GPU Password Recovery. The supported video cards at this point in time are ATI HD RV7×0s cards that include ATI Radeon 4870, 4890 and 4770 or Nvidia cards supported CUDA including GTX 260, 8600 GTS or 8600 GT. It is also recommended to have the latest Catalyst or Geforce drivers installed.

The developer provides some plain numbers to show the effectiveness of using the GPU to recover a rar password with four characters:

  • ~168 passwords per second on single core of Q6600 @ 2.4Ghz (crark’s result)
  • ~325 passwords per second on 8600 GT
  • ~3120 passwords per second on ATI HD4850
  • ~2075 passwords per second on GTX260/192SP

The performance of the listed ATI card is almost 20 times that of a password recovery where only the cpu is used. The password recovery software is a command line utility and the developer is offering extensive information on the possible parameters that can be used to recover the password. The suggested length of the password should not exceed six characters although it is theoretically possible to start a password recovery for a password with up to 17 chars.

The basic command for the password recovery is:

igrargpu.exe [switch:param] filename.rar

The command

igrargpu.exe /a:b /c:s /min:1 /max:4 archive.rar

will for example check all four letter combinations of lower case Latin characters. Known characters of the password can be added to the command to speed up the recovery attempt.It is advised to check the readme for a detailed overview of all possible parameters. The password recovery program can also use a dictionary based attack with rules. RAR GPU Password recovery should work on most versions of the Microsoft Windows operating system. The portable software is available for download at the developer’s website.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2009/09/05/gpu-password-recovery-for-rar-archives/feed/ 0 Password Recovery Questions Make Online Accounts Vulnerable http://www.ghacks.net/2009/07/01/password-recovery-questions-make-online-accounts-vulnerable/ http://www.ghacks.net/2009/07/01/password-recovery-questions-make-online-accounts-vulnerable/#comments Wed, 01 Jul 2009 20:19:54 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=14058 Password recovery questions are great to recover a forgotten password in a matter of seconds. All that needs to be done is to answer the password recovery question to receive a new password in the email inbox. This does however make email hacking a profitable business as email accounts are usually connected to online stores and other web services. Attackers with access to a compromised email account only need to answer the secret question to retrieve the password of the web account. This matter is definitely more secure than sending out the password without confirmation on the user’s request.

A recent study shows on the other hand that password recovery questions are usually answered honestly. Questions about the birth town, mother’s maiden name or first animal name can sometimes be easily guesses. The study asked acquaintances of 32 webmail users to guess the answer to the secret question. Roughly 20% of these answers were guessed correctly.

Password recovery questions should therefor not be answered honestly. Experienced users fill them out with password like characters which makes the answers more or less impossible to guess. These answers can then be stored in password managers as notes.

How do you handle password recovery questions?

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2009/07/01/password-recovery-questions-make-online-accounts-vulnerable/feed/ 10 Software Management: Sysinternals And Nirsoft System Control http://www.ghacks.net/2009/04/26/software-management-sysinternals-and-nirsoft-system-control/ http://www.ghacks.net/2009/04/26/software-management-sysinternals-and-nirsoft-system-control/#comments Sat, 25 Apr 2009 22:12:07 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/2009/04/25/software-management-sysinternals-and-nirsoft-system-control/ microsoft windowsTwo of the most popular and respected software developers are NirSoft and Sysinternals. They both produce high quality software programs for the Windows operating system that is often considered the best of its kind. The sheer amount of software programs makes it sometimes difficulty to keep an overview of the programs. That’s where the portable application launcher Windows System Control Center comes into play. The program provides an interface for the applications of both NirSoft and Sysinternals making it an ideal candidate for every portable software collection.

The program has to be pointed to the location of the programs at first startup. The only requirement is that they have to reside in the same directory structure. It should also be noted that the live urls are also supported and available alternatively. The software management tool will then display its main interface which is divided into two columns. The left column contains categories while the right the descriptions and start links of the software programs listed in those categories.

software management

The three main categories Sysinternals Suite, NirSoft utilities and Windows Utilities are divided further into subcategories like Networking Utilities, Password Recovery or Security Utilities. The Windows Utilities category contains links to dozens of tools provided by the Windows operating system including services configuration and various monitoring and networking tools.

Each entry can be added to the listing of favorite applications which provides quick access to them. A search is also available that can be used to quickly find applications based on their name or purpose.

Windows System Control Center is a helpful software management tool for users who work regularly with NirSoft and / or Sysinternals software programs.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2009/04/26/software-management-sysinternals-and-nirsoft-system-control/feed/ 3 How To Reset the Root Password in Linux http://www.ghacks.net/2009/02/25/how-to-reset-the-root-password-in-linux/ http://www.ghacks.net/2009/02/25/how-to-reset-the-root-password-in-linux/#comments Wed, 25 Feb 2009 17:28:15 +0000 Jack Wallen http://www.ghacks.net/?p=10764 I administer a LOT of Linux systems. Most of those systems information are in a file I keep that tells me what their passwords are. I normally either do not forget a root password or do not lose the paperwork for a Linux system. But I have been in situations where a new client had no idea what their Linux root password was. In those instances I had to change the root password. Problem is, if you don’t know the root password, how are you going to change it? You need to know a method of password recovery for the Linux operating system.

There is a way to do this. It will work with most systems that use a root password. Of course if we’re talking about a lost boot password, you’re out of luck…this won’t help you recover that. What this method does is reboot your machine into what is called “single user mode”. Single user mode is also referred to as maintenance mode and is runlevel 1.

Reboot the Machine

The first thing you need to do is reboot the machine in question. The next step will vary, depending upon your distribution. What you need to do is to get to the screen that allows you to select which kernel to boot. Some systems (such as Fedora 10) require you to hit the escape key before the kernel boots. Some systems require a Ctrl-x key combination. Some systems require you to hit the “e” key. With Fedora 10 the sequence is this: After your bios posts you will hit the escape key to open up the Grub boot menu. In that menu select the kernel you are going to boot and hit the “a” key (for “append”). What you will see is the kernel boot command for your machine. What you need to do is append single to the end of that command (make sure there is a space before single) and hit the enter key.

Your machine will now start the single user boot process. You will see some processes list as “fail”. Do not worry about this. Eventually you will find yourself at a root prompt. At this point all you need to do is enter the command passwd and then type the new password for the root user when prompted.

Once you have entered the new root password reboot the machine by issuing the reboot command. When the machine reboots you will have recovered the root password. Congratulations!

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2009/02/25/how-to-reset-the-root-password-in-linux/feed/ 13 Password Recovery Software PicoZip http://www.ghacks.net/2008/12/26/password-recovery-software-picozip/ http://www.ghacks.net/2008/12/26/password-recovery-software-picozip/#comments Fri, 26 Dec 2008 17:44:14 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=9375 A password protected zip archive cannot be accessed unless the password can be supplied to unlock it. The only other method of accessing a password protected zip file would be to use a password recovery software like PicoZip.

The password recovery software supports both dictionary and brute force methods. The first relies on known words while the second method will test all possible character combinations. A dictionary attack can only be successful if the creator has chosen a dictionary word as the password. Using dictionaries as the recovery method can be much faster than the brute force approach.

The recovery software is easy to use. All that needs to be done is to load a password protected zip file into the program’s interface. A dictionary has to be loaded if the dictionary recovery method is selected. The brute force recovery method requires a few additional parameters. The range of characters has to be selected as well as the minimum and maximum length of the password.

password recovery software

The password recovery software did test 13503531 passwords in 137 seconds on a Windows XP Service Pack 3 system with 4 Gigabytes of computer memory and a Intel Core Duo processor with 3.0 GHz. It would still take hundreds of years to test all possible password combinations of a size between 3 and 12 characters (alphanumerical).

Brute forcing makes therefor only sense if the password length is not greater than 6 unknown chars. It should also be noted that the recovery time is the maximum time needed. If the password length is lower it will not take that long.

The developer’s website contains dictionaries that can be used in the password recovery software.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2008/12/26/password-recovery-software-picozip/feed/ 5 Outlook Express Password Recovery http://www.ghacks.net/2008/08/08/outlook-express-password-recovery/ http://www.ghacks.net/2008/08/08/outlook-express-password-recovery/#comments Fri, 08 Aug 2008 18:01:00 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=5971 It is beyond me why someone would still use Outlook Express unless company’s policies would force him to do so. Many users probably use it because it is there within Windows by default and because it works. If you are one of those users you might like to continue reading this article about password recovery in Outlook Express.

Outlook Express Password Recovery by Passcape (via Techmixer) is able to recover all saved passwords in Outlook Express including smtp, pop3 and imap passwords. It does that by either decrypting the passwords or revealing the real chars behind asterisks depending on the menu in Microsoft Outlook Express.

It can even decrypt passwords directly from the ntuser.dat file which is handy if only the files but not the installation can be accessed.

outlook express recovery password software

The password recovery software is compatible to Microsoft Outlook Express 4-6 and can be installed on most Windows operating systems starting with Windows 95 including Windows XP and Windows 2003 Server. Passwords can be exported in text, Microsoft Excel and html files.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2008/08/08/outlook-express-password-recovery/feed/ 0 Recover Lost Outlook Passwords http://www.ghacks.net/2008/06/03/recover-lost-outlook-passwords/ http://www.ghacks.net/2008/06/03/recover-lost-outlook-passwords/#comments Mon, 02 Jun 2008 23:53:54 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=4691 Microsoft Outlook .pst (Personal Folder) files can be password protected with a very weak encryption algorithm which is great for users who have forgotten the password of their password protected files. Those users, and anyone else, will unfortunately also come to the conclusion that a weak password protection might keep a spying wife or co-worker at bay but not a single user who knows what he is doing.

Nirsoft created the PstPassword (via Genbeta) application, a Outlook PST Password Recovery software compatible to Outlook 97, Outlook 2000, Outlook XP, Outlook 2003, and Outlook 2007 which does not require Outlook to be installed on the system to recover the passwords. As usual the software can be run from any location on the hard drive without installation.

It also comes with a graphical user interface and command line options, high quality like usual. All pst files of the user who is logged into the system will be displayed automatically. Other pst files can be dragged into the program window or loaded from the File menu.

recover outlook password

Several passwords can restore the contents of a pst file which is why PstPassword displays three working ones after analysing the pst file. Each password will work and it can be that none of them is the original password that was used to password protect the file. The list of passwords can be saved in various formats for later usage.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2008/06/03/recover-lost-outlook-passwords/feed/ 3 Howto log into windows xp if you lost your password http://www.ghacks.net/2006/06/25/howto-log-into-windows-xp-if-you-lost-your-password/ http://www.ghacks.net/2006/06/25/howto-log-into-windows-xp-if-you-lost-your-password/#comments Sun, 25 Jun 2006 17:53:42 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/2006/06/25/howto-log-into-windows-xp-if-you-lost-your-password/ I once had the problem that I changed some settings in windows which disabled my automatic login into windows xp. I was prompted to enter my login details and could not remember them at all. The following method could be working in this and similar cases. You could try using the default Administrator login and leave the password blank. This should work for every computer where the admin password has not been changed.

You might need to boot into safe mode if the target system does not use the welcome screen of windows xp or if you can´t log off. (Try hitting CTRL + ALT + DEL twice)  Boot into safe mode by hitting F8 at the boot process and select Boot Windows in Safe Mode. The following welcome screen will display the Adminstrator icon next to others. If you have not changed the password you will be able to login by leaving the password empty. This way you are logged in as administrator and will be able to change the passwords of the other users.

source

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2006/06/25/howto-log-into-windows-xp-if-you-lost-your-password/feed/ 0 Password Recovery Speeds http://www.ghacks.net/2006/04/04/password-recovery-speeds/ http://www.ghacks.net/2006/04/04/password-recovery-speeds/#comments Tue, 04 Apr 2006 07:41:15 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=374 password recovery speeds. It compares password length and chars used to the time different computers need to bruteforce the password, ranging from Class A (speed of a pentium 100) to Class F (supercomputers, large scale distribution) computers.]]> Now this is an interesting analysis of password recovery speeds. It compares password length and chars used to the time different computers need to bruteforce the password, ranging from Class A (speed of a pentium 100) to Class F (supercomputers, large scale distribution) computers.

They take a look at passwords that consist of only numbers, only letters, a combination of numbers and letters and finally letters and numbers and common symbols. For example a six digit password could be cracked by a Class A computer in about 9 hours while a Class F one would reveal the password in the same instance you started the process. Take a look and calculate how long it would take that someone could bruteforce your passwords.

It´s of course a different story if something prevents the bruteforce process to continue, for example online banking accounts disable the account after three failed login attempts.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2006/04/04/password-recovery-speeds/feed/ 0 Password resetting and recovering techniques http://www.ghacks.net/2006/01/05/password-resetting-and-recovering-techniques/ http://www.ghacks.net/2006/01/05/password-resetting-and-recovering-techniques/#comments Thu, 05 Jan 2006 07:51:27 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=268 Offline NT Password & Registry Editor or the linux live distribution Austrumi.]]> There are several methods to reset and recover your windows administrators password. The fastest method is to use a freeware tool like Offline NT Password & Registry Editor or the Linux live distribution Austrumi.

The author of Offline NT Password & Registry Editor provides a bootdisk for his program while austrumi already is bootable. A detailed instruction for the first tool can be found at the authors website, with Astrumi you simply enter nt_boot when the command prompt appears.

You could also try to bruteforce your way in again but this is not recommended because the other two methods are easier and faster.

Last but not least this was taken from a user comment and not checked.

1) copy cmd.exe out of system32
2) rename as logon.scr
3) paste it back in system32 and replace current one
4) log off and wait for the screensaver. it will be a command prompt. use [net user]

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2006/01/05/password-resetting-and-recovering-techniques/feed/ 2 Ophcrack 2.0 Windows Password Recovery http://www.ghacks.net/2005/12/10/ophcrack-20-windows-password-recovery/ http://www.ghacks.net/2005/12/10/ophcrack-20-windows-password-recovery/#comments Sat, 10 Dec 2005 08:43:55 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=212 Ophcrack is a Windows password cracker based on a time-memory trade-off using rainbow tables. This is a new variant of Hellman’s original trade-off, with better performance. It recovers 99.9% of alphanumeric passwords in seconds.

windows password cracker

You can download a .iso file that contains a live cd. In case you forgot your password you boot from the live cd and try to recover the password using the live cd.

[tags]windows, password recovery, lost password, freeware[/tags]

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