Cybersecurity experts have tested the latest productive artificial intelligence to work with passwords. This is a neural network that initially generates code words and learns as it progresses. However, it turned out that it can also be used in the opposite direction, that is, for brute force or password selection.

Great and dangerous opportunities

The experts “fed” the neural network with 15 million account data and were horrified by the result.

• 51 percent of passwords were cracked in less than a minute.
• Already in an hour it was possible to get 65 percent of the passwords.
• After a day of work, 71 percent of passwords surrendered.
• Within a month, 81 percent of passwords were hacked.

After analyzing the results of the experiment, the scientists discovered several regularities:

• First, single-digit passwords are cracked by artificial intelligence instantly or in seconds.
• Secondly, the presence of letters in the password, numbers and different states proportionally affect the hacking time. For example, in 7 billion years at the current level of technology development, a password consisting of 28 numbers and letters in different states will be chosen by artificial intelligence.
• Third, passwords consisting of numbers, symbols and letters belonging to different records are completely protected from brute force by a neural network. Experts recommend that everyone, without exception, use these passwords.

The boundary between passwords that can be cracked instantly or quickly and passwords that are hard to crack are 12-character passwords that use both uppercase and lowercase letters. It would take 289 years for an AI to crack such a password. Whereas, it only takes three weeks to crack a similar password, but only in lowercase letters. At the same time, five-character passwords will be instantly cracked by artificial intelligence, even if numbers, letters and special characters are used in both cases.

How can you check the reliability of your password?

The developers have launched a tool that lets you control how strong your password is and how long it will take to crack it.

All it takes is to enter the password in a special field. The company doesn’t ask for logins, phone numbers or emails, so you don’t have to worry about someone stealing your combination. However, for greater certainty, when entering a password, you can easily replace characters with the same characteristics (lowercase and uppercase letters, symbols, numbers, if any) – that is, their numbers will remain the same, only different positions. In addition, the company promises that the entries are completely private and will not be stored or shared in any way.

This feature can also be used to create a strong password: enter characters in the field until you see it long enough to crack it.