Science Buddies: "Ask an Expert"

Method #3: dictionary attack using a list of common passwords. A third method takes advantage of a list of passwords that people often use in real life. Mark Burnett, the author of the book Perfect Passwords compiled a list of the 500 most common passwords used in 2005. We started with that list to make a list of 400+ words, saved in passwords.txt. This third method tries all of these passwords. Since people may use capital letters or not, it also tries each word with the first letter as a capital.

Method #4: advanced dictionary attack that combines words. The fourth method builds on the third and takes advantage of the fact that people very often use passwords that combine two words with a number or punctuation in between. A fan of wizarding stories might use the password "Harry+Ginny" for example, where the password is much stronger than either "Harry" or "Ginny" alone (unless someone knows you like those characters). It also changes the punctuation in the middle and utilizes capital letters at the beginning of words as well.