Re: Password entropy

[Roger Safian <r-safian () NORTHWESTERN EDU>]

At 06:45 PM 7/19/2006, Basgen, Brian put fingers to keyboard and wrote:
> Scott,
>
> > Which is a better password?
> >
> >      abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
> >      1angtPalftm
>
> The second one is better by far. Cracking time is a function of
> entropy, the more basic the pattern, the less entropy. The first
> 'password' you show has a very simple pattern.

Are there programs out there now that are smart enough to figure that
out though?  I haven't seen them.  Most seem to try variations on
a pattern.  Now you could seed that pattern, but that seems a bit
like cheating to me.


--
Roger A. Safian
r-safian () northwestern edu (email) public key available on many key servers.
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