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How Secure Are Your Passwords?

CSEF · 2017 Computational Systems & Analysis

Jonathan W. Weakliem · La Colina Junior High School, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara County

Overview

Objectives/Goals The objective is to see what makes a password hard for password cracking software to recover and what variables of a password make it most secure. Methods/Materials Laptop, John the Ripper software, Python software, Command prompt. Encrypted sample passwords with python and ran John the Ripper against them while timing it. Results Adding anything to a password makes it harder to crack. I found that adding symbols was the variable that made passwords most secure. Conclusions/Discussion The data showed that adding anything to a password made it (on average) take longer to crack. It also showed that adding symbols made passwords the hardest to crack on the order of several hours.

Summary statement

I showed that adding anything to your password makes it harder to crack.

Help received

I got some basic information about encryptions and passwords from a grad student in computer science and some basic computer assistance from a family member. I ran the programs, created the lists of passwords, and analyzed/ recorded results.

Competition history

  • CSEF 2017 Computational Systems & Analysis · Entry J0817

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