![]() In my experience it is more reliable than the other tool. Kon Boot - This boots the Windows system that is password protected, but hot patches it to disable asking you for a password - you just get logged in as administrator automatically. So sometimes it just doesn't work, and risks corrupting the SAM. It works most of the time, but the support for the Security Accounts Manager (SAM) - where Windows stores password hashes - is not perfect. Offline NT Password & Registry Editor - This is actually a bootable Linux system, which can read the Windows file system, and reset a password hash. Two popular boot CDs work in completely different ways: All security professionals know that a non-encrypted disk is not safe against an attacker with physical access. The reset CDs do NOT work if the disk is encrypted. I presume this key simply packages existing software in a pre-packaged key. You can put a slightly modified image on a bootable USB stick. There have been Windows password reset CDs for some years that let you do this. The operating system uses disk encryption and requires a password upon boot - not just as a verification, but because the encryption key is derived from the password ( TrueCrypt can do that).Īlso, as explains, a password reset is not recovery: that which was encrypted with a key derived from the old password remains inaccessible. The boot-on-USB option was deactivated in the BIOS, and a BIOS password was set to prevent reactivation (of course, some BIOS accept "default passwords", and a BIOS password can be cleared by removing the CMOS battery, which is doable with physical access and a screwdriver). This password reset method will fail if any of the following holds: Downloadable boot images which can do the same thing from a "normal" USB flash drive can be obtained from various places, e.g. The USB device is nothing special: it is just a normal USB flash drive the "added value" of this device is purely aesthetic. Quickly regain control of the PC and get back to work.īasically you reboot the PC with a custom OS located on the USB flash drive itself from that OS, the relevant files on the disk are modified. Using the key you can boot the PC into a special admin mode that allows you to view all of the user accounts and reset any password. The kickstarter page actually gives away the method: Then reboot and log in with recovered passwords. Extract the hashes from the SAM, feed them to a cracking program. To recover the password you need a tool like John the Ripper, Lopht or HashCat. In addition, it may give access to additional resources (e.g. Access to EFS and DPAPI resources is lost even if the administrator resets the password.Ī recovered password allows continued access to EFS and DPAPI protected resources. When the user changes their password, they are re-encrypted with the new KEK. However resetting a windows password denies access to EFS encrypted files and DPAPI encrypted data, since the keys for these are encrypted using a KEK derived from the password. In summary: Just write blank password entries into the SAM (which is basically just stored in the registry protected by an ACL so only SYSTEM can access it). I suspect this USB stick just boots to a version of Linux and runs a few scripts. This is trivial, and there are many tools which can do it, such as Trinity Recovery Kit. The password can be reset by booting to another operating system and editing the registry hive. Resetting a windows password is not equivalent to recovering a windows password. Just curious if anyone knows whats going on behind the curtain. I'm not looking to knock off the product, in fact, I think quite the opposite, its a cool piece of kit and may purchase one for kicks. I'm a security professional and penetration tester by trade, but no administrative windows expert and most of my work is done remotely, so I put this out to the on-site guys and the windows experts. My question is, does anyone know what this could be running to make this happen? Is it rubber ducky-like ( ) or something else? I know there are software like Katana and the like that can do similar things. Obviously the magic to this piece of hardware is what's contained on it, and if that is true, any usb key could be used to accomplish the same job. This tool requires physical access of course, and there are many things you can do once you have physical access, but this peaked my curiosity.
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