note 16953 added to function.md5
| From: | rambo_temp at pbt-unknown dot org | Date: | Tue, 20 Nov 2001 07:22:18 +0000 |
| Subject: | note 16953 added to function.md5 | ||
| Groups: | php.notes | ||
| Request: | Send a blank email to php-notes+get-21046@lists.php.net to get a copy of this message | ||
On MD5 security:
Your attacker did not attack the hash algorithm but the passwords (usually THE weakest link of any
authentication system) to get decent entropy into a password you need 13-15 pseudo-random (ie. they
seem random but you have some rules for remembering them) characters, even these can be cracked
within a month or so if the attacker has a distributed cracking program (like in your case) and a
few number computers to do the number crunching (this is why we should change our passwords
monthly).
Anything that is either a dictionary word (40MB word list is a LOT of words), or only slightly
varies (few chracters added to end or beginning of the word) from a dictionary word will be broken
in matter of seconds.
To get security you could use SSL or IPSec (depending if it's web or more general networking)
with client-side certificates stored on crypto hardware (so the certificate never leaves the secure
environment, the hardware handles signing authentication packets), smartcards require (rather
expensive) readers, I would go with USB tokens (they look sexier too).
--
http://www.php.net/manual/en/function.md5.php
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