Password strength

[Andre Kesteloot]

Strength of passwords
In addition to protecting your passwords, some programs tell you how strong
your passwords are so that you can create better ones. Password strength
depends largely on the length and complexity of the words you choose.
Here’s how long it would probably take a hacker to guess your password:
If your password uses only lowercase letters and numbers:     It will take
a hacker this long to crack it:
Three characters     0.02 seconds
Four characters     0.46 seconds
Five characters     11.9 seconds
Six characters     5.15 minutes
Seven characters     2.23 hours
Eight characters     2.42 days
12 characters     3.03 millennia


If your password uses all types of characters, including upper- and
lowercase and:     It will take a hacker this long to crack it:
Three characters     0.86 seconds
Four characters     1.36 minutes
Five characters     2.15 hours
Six characters     8.51 days
Seven characters     2.21 years
Eight characters     2.21 centuries
12 characters     7.1 million millennia

Note that adding just one capital letter and one special character changes
the time needed to hack an eight-character password from 2.4 days to 2.1
centuries. Now you know why so many sites require that you use
eight-character passwords that contain upper- and lowercase letters,
numbers, and special characters!
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