Antzz
03-17-2008, 07:05 AM
Antzz,
If you invited me to try and crack your password, you know the one that you use over and over for like every web page you visit, how many guesses would it take before I got it?
Let’s see… here is my top 10 list. I can obtain most of this information much easier than you think, then I might just be able to get into your e-mail or computer . After all, if I get into one I’ll probably get into all of them.
1. Your girlfriend/boyfriend, child, or pet’s name, possibly followed by a 0 or 1 (because they’re always making you use a number, aren’t they?)
2. The last 4 digits of your phone number
3. 123, 1234, 12345, qapl, qwerty etc..
4. "password"
5. City, footbal team, school
6. Date of birth - yours, family
7. "god"
8. "letmein"
9. "money"
10. "love"
Statistically speaking that should probably cover about 20% of you. But don’t worry. If I didn’t get it yet it will probably only take a few more minutes before I do… and dont worry i dont hack peoples accounts for fun.
Hackers, and I’m not talking about the ethical kind, have developed a whole range of tools to get at your personal data. And the main impediment standing between your information remaining safe, or leaking out, is the password you choose. (Ironically, the best protection people have is usually the one they take least seriously.)
One of the simplest ways to gain access to your information is through the use of a Brute Force Attack. This is accomplished when a hacker uses a specially written piece of software to attempt to log into a site using your credentials.
How fast someone can hack you
If your password contains 3, 4 or 5 letters using only lower case it would take a matter of just over 11 seconds.
My Advice?
1. Randomly substitute numbers for letters that look similar. The letter ‘o’ becomes the number ‘0′, or even better an ‘@’ or ‘*’. (i.e. - m0d3ltf0rd… like modelTford)
2. Randomly throw in capital letters (i.e. - Mod3lTF0rd)
3. Maybe a place you loved, or a specific car, an attraction from a vacation, or a favorite restaurant or even a favourite childhood friend
4. Once you’ve thought of a password, try Microsoft’s password strength tester to find out how secure it is.
Often times people also reason that all of their passwords and logins are stored on their computer at home, which is safe behind a router or firewall device. Of course, they’ve never bothered to change the default password on that device, so someone could drive up and park near the house, use a laptop to breach the wireless network and then try passwords from this list until they gain control of your network - after which time they will own you!
Now I realise that every day we encounter people who over-exaggerate points in order to move us to action, but trust me this is not one of those times. There are 50 other ways you can be compromised and punished for using weak passwords that I haven’t even mentioned
I also realise that most people just don’t care about all this until it’s too late and they’ve learned a very hard lesson. But why don’t you do me, and yourself, a favor and take a little action to strengthen your passwords and let me know that all the time I spent on this post wasnt a waste of time and effort.
-Antzz
If you invited me to try and crack your password, you know the one that you use over and over for like every web page you visit, how many guesses would it take before I got it?
Let’s see… here is my top 10 list. I can obtain most of this information much easier than you think, then I might just be able to get into your e-mail or computer . After all, if I get into one I’ll probably get into all of them.
1. Your girlfriend/boyfriend, child, or pet’s name, possibly followed by a 0 or 1 (because they’re always making you use a number, aren’t they?)
2. The last 4 digits of your phone number
3. 123, 1234, 12345, qapl, qwerty etc..
4. "password"
5. City, footbal team, school
6. Date of birth - yours, family
7. "god"
8. "letmein"
9. "money"
10. "love"
Statistically speaking that should probably cover about 20% of you. But don’t worry. If I didn’t get it yet it will probably only take a few more minutes before I do… and dont worry i dont hack peoples accounts for fun.
Hackers, and I’m not talking about the ethical kind, have developed a whole range of tools to get at your personal data. And the main impediment standing between your information remaining safe, or leaking out, is the password you choose. (Ironically, the best protection people have is usually the one they take least seriously.)
One of the simplest ways to gain access to your information is through the use of a Brute Force Attack. This is accomplished when a hacker uses a specially written piece of software to attempt to log into a site using your credentials.
How fast someone can hack you
If your password contains 3, 4 or 5 letters using only lower case it would take a matter of just over 11 seconds.
My Advice?
1. Randomly substitute numbers for letters that look similar. The letter ‘o’ becomes the number ‘0′, or even better an ‘@’ or ‘*’. (i.e. - m0d3ltf0rd… like modelTford)
2. Randomly throw in capital letters (i.e. - Mod3lTF0rd)
3. Maybe a place you loved, or a specific car, an attraction from a vacation, or a favorite restaurant or even a favourite childhood friend
4. Once you’ve thought of a password, try Microsoft’s password strength tester to find out how secure it is.
Often times people also reason that all of their passwords and logins are stored on their computer at home, which is safe behind a router or firewall device. Of course, they’ve never bothered to change the default password on that device, so someone could drive up and park near the house, use a laptop to breach the wireless network and then try passwords from this list until they gain control of your network - after which time they will own you!
Now I realise that every day we encounter people who over-exaggerate points in order to move us to action, but trust me this is not one of those times. There are 50 other ways you can be compromised and punished for using weak passwords that I haven’t even mentioned
I also realise that most people just don’t care about all this until it’s too late and they’ve learned a very hard lesson. But why don’t you do me, and yourself, a favor and take a little action to strengthen your passwords and let me know that all the time I spent on this post wasnt a waste of time and effort.
-Antzz