Re: Passwords & Passphrases

["Peters, Kevin" <Kevin.Peters () OLC STATE OH US>]

Let's see...

The number one password is password. 
The number two password is no password. 
In War Games the backdoor was the son's name (what was that name?)
In Spaceballs Mel Brooks luggage password was 12345. 
The number one place to save a password is on a post-it note placed "somewhere" within inches of the user's PC. (We all 
have our favorites - I like under my mouse pad)

My team still believes that the best password is *********  That is the password they see every time I log into the 
network when using a data projector, and you know they are still trying to figure that one out. 

Here is my question - does anyone have the data on how many times a hack (attack) has occurred associated to breaking 
the "launch codes" from outside of the organization?  The last information I gleaned from the FBI reports (several 
years ago) indicated that 70 percent of hackings (attacks) were internal.

My most recent experience with intrusions has had nothing to do with a compromised password, rather an exploit of some 
vunerability in the OS, database, or application.  

In the end it still comes down to social engineering. The harder we make it for our users to log onto the business 
network, the more our users will resist.  We need to be exploring new technology in this area.  

I recently read an article on password systems.  The basis of the article was that the best password was the human 
face. When the user would log on three grids would be presented with nine human faces on each grid, presented randomly 
within each grid. The user would select one face from each grid. Okay, hack that one.   (I use Rocky and Bullwinkle and 
Boris)

What is the question again?  I have forgotten...  Oh yea, passwords!  By the time we figure out a standard, someone 
will have moved the cheese and the monkey. The face of the future will be a face, when it comes to passwords. 

Kp

----- Original Message -----
From: Harold Winshel <winshel () CAMDEN RUTGERS EDU>
To: SECURITY () LISTSERV EDUCAUSE EDU <SECURITY () LISTSERV EDUCAUSE EDU>
Sent: Mon Nov 19 17:56:03 2007
Subject: Re: [SECURITY] Passwords & Passphrases

Are you saying a password cracking program is more likely to guess 
the letter "a" repeated 15 times or that an individual user trying to 
break in to a machine will more likely try that?

Harold

At 05:37 PM 11/19/2007, Alex wrote:
> Harold:
>
> I think there is confusion betweeen pure mathematical probability and
> probability based on historical attacks/human created passwords.
> An attacker is more likely to try repetitive or dictionary-based/hybrid
> attacks over a network (or against a hash) than random passwords.
> Additionally, people are more likely to use certain characters than others
> when creating passwords (e.g. wheel of fortune).
>
> Therefore, user created passwords are not random.
>
> So, given that we know attackers typically use 'easy' passwords, the
> character 'a' repeated 15 times is more likely to be cracked than a 15
> character passphrase.
> Likely, so is a 15 character passphrase when compared to a truly randomly
> generated password of 15 characters from the same character set.
> Hence, we have password complexity rules as those in Microsoft Server 2003
> and linux.
>
> -Alex
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Harold Winshel [mailto:winshel () CAMDEN RUTGERS EDU]
> Sent: Monday, November 19, 2007 5:16 PM
> To: SECURITY () LISTSERV EDUCAUSE EDU
> Subject: Re: [SECURITY] Passwords & Passphrases
>
> I may have missed some of the earlier emails but I thought that a 15
> character passphrase is as secure as a 15 character random password.
>
> For that matter, I thought the  user could use the letter "a" fifteen times
> and it could be as secure as a random 15-character password or a
> 15-character password such as '"I don't like the Red Sox" (I think that's
> more than 15, though).
>
> Harold
>
>
> At 04:44 PM 11/19/2007, Roger Safian wrote:
> > At 02:01 PM 11/19/2007, Martin Manjak put fingers to keyboard and wrote:
> > > move beyond 8 characters with mixed case and special characters. I
> > > would like to see us require a 15 character pass phrase which, in my
> > > view, is more secure (even without complexity), and both easier to
> > > type and remember.
> >
> > Personally I'd love to see a password minimum length of 15 characters.
> >
> > My fear is that a password database get's compromised, and the weak
> > passwords are cracked and bad things take place.  I think that 15
> > characters is a long enough string to make brute force cracking time
> > consuming enough to allow us to change the passwords in a reasonable
> > time-frame.
> >
> > I think the reality is that 15 characters will be too much for the
> > community.  We'll see.
> >
> >
> > --
> > Roger A. Safian
> > r-safian () northwestern edu (email) public key available on many key servers.
> > (847) 491-4058   (voice)
> > (847) 467-6500   (Fax) "You're never too old to have a great childhood!"
>
> Harold Winshel
> Computing and Instructional Technologies Faculty of Arts & Sciences Rutgers
> University, Camden Campus
> 311 N. 5th Street, Room B10 Armitage Hall Camden NJ 08102
> (856) 225-6669 (O)

Harold Winshel
Computing and Instructional Technologies
Faculty of Arts & Sciences
Rutgers University, Camden Campus
311 N. 5th Street, Room B10 Armitage Hall
Camden NJ 08102
(856) 225-6669 (O)