How Windows,Linux,Mac OS Stores your Passwords
Everyone who use a desktop will be experienced to login to the Operating System.
If you are a Windows lover or a Linux user, you will be very well experienced the situation of typing the username and the password for logging in to use the OS.
Have you ever thought of how the passwords are stored in Windows? Windows usually hashes your passwords using LM Hash [LanMan or LAN Manager hash] or NTLM (NT LAN Manager) algorithms and then stores them in C:windowssystem32configSAM.
So are you going to open that SAM file ? Freeze !! SAM file is encrypted and hence locked with the C:windowssystem32configsystem. Thus you cannot open(decrypt) these files when the Windows Operating System is running.
In Linux, the root passwords will be stored at /etc/shadow or /etc/passwd. Here also they are encrypted.
In the similar way Mac also stores the encrypted passwords using the LM+NTLM hashes.
Knowing where the passwords reside in your OS will help you in decrypting them at times when you forgot the passwords. There are several tools available for decrypting the stored passwords in your OS. Tools will be covered in the next posts.
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