Article View: sci.crypt
Article #4275Re: password security
From: Paul De Bra
Date: Fri, 23 Dec 1988 21:20
Date: Fri, 23 Dec 1988 21:20
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1776 bytes
In article <5835@saturn.ucsc.edu> haynes@ucscc.UCSC.EDU (Jim Haynes) writes: }In article <5005@b-tech.ann-arbor.mi.us> zeeff@b-tech.ann-arbor.mi.us (Jon Zeeff) writes: }>The simple solution seems to be to force users to use some non alpha }>character somewhere in the middle of their passwords. Users then tend }>to use a combination of two words which prevents the dictionary search. } }the 4.3-tahoe-BSD version of passwd seems to do this. At least the last }time I logged into a tahoe system and tried to change my password it }wouldn't rest until I had put a non-alphabetic character into it. }Had the same experience on a Convex machine. } Requiring the use of a non-alphanumeric character is not at all sufficient. Many people react to this by just putting a special character (usually ".") in front of their old password... Now, if you start by forcing users to put the non alphanumeric char somewhere in the middle of the password this would no longer work, but users will still come up with passwords that are a lot easier to guess than zXk.4;ur... Paul. -- ------------------------------------------------------ |debra@research.att.com | uunet!research!debra | ------------------------------------------------------
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Path: arc1-ca.pugleaf.net!utzoo!attcan!uunet!peregrine!elroy!ames!ucsd!rutgers!att!ulysses!andante!alice!debra From: debra@alice.UUCP (Paul De Bra) Newsgroups: sci.crypt,comp.unix.wizards,news.sysadmin Subject: Re: password security Message-ID: <8594@alice.UUCP> Date: 23 Dec 88 21:20:07 GMT References: <11013@ulysses.homer.nj.att.com> <2308@cuuxb.ATT.COM> <4420@xenna.Encore.COM> <259@gloom.UUCP> <5005@b-tech.ann-arbor.mi.us> <5835@saturn.ucsc.edu> Reply-To: debra@alice.UUCP () Organization: AT&T, Bell Labs Lines: 24