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Cracking Passwords Using John the Ripper: A Complete Step-by-Step Guide


Cracking Passwords Using John the Ripper: A Complete Step-by-Step Guide





In today's post, we’re diving into a practical lab exercise that shows how to use John the Ripper, one of the most effective password-cracking tools in cybersecurity. Whether you're an IT professional or a cybersecurity student, mastering John the Ripper will help you understand password vulnerabilities and enhance your penetration testing skills.

Lab Objective:

The goal of this lab is to crack the root password on a Linux system (Support) and extract the password from a password-protected ZIP file (located on IT-Laptop). Both tasks are performed using John the Ripper.

Steps to Crack the Root Password on Support:

  1. Open the Terminal on the Support system.
  2. Change directories to /usr/share/john.
  3. List the files and open password.lst to view common password guesses.
  4. Use John the Ripper to crack the root password by running john /etc/shadow.
  5. Once cracked, the password is stored in the john.pot file for future use.
  6. Check the cracked password by viewing the contents of john.pot.

Result: The root password was cracked and displayed as 1worm4b8.

Steps to Crack the Protected ZIP File on IT-Laptop:

  1. Open the Terminal on IT-Laptop and list the files in the home directory.
  2. Use zip2john to extract the password hashes from the ZIP file and store them in a text file.
  3. Crack the password by running John the Ripper with the extracted hashes.
  4. View the cracked password by running john ziphash.txt --show.

Result: The ZIP file password was successfully cracked, giving access to its sensitive contents.

This hands-on guide provides a thorough understanding of password-cracking techniques using John the Ripper, an essential skill for cybersecurity experts.

Conclusion: Password cracking tools like John the Ripper play a critical role in ethical hacking and network security. By understanding how these tools work, IT professionals can improve their ability to defend against unauthorized access and strengthen overall security measures.

Stay tuned for more cybersecurity tips and tutorials!

#JohnTheRipper #CyberSecurity #PasswordCracking #TechLab #EthicalHacking #PenTesting #ITSecurity #HackingTutorial


 

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