How Researchers Cracked an 11-Year-Old Password to a $3 Million Crypto Wallet

Thanks to a flaw in a decade-old version of the RoboForm password manager and a bit of luck, researchers managed to unearth the password to a crypto wallet containing a fortune.

The Beginning of the Journey

Two years ago, “Michael,” a cryptocurrency owner in Europe who wished to remain anonymous, contacted Joe Grand for help. Michael had stored about $2 million worth of bitcoin in a password-protected digital wallet but had lost the password. He had used the RoboForm password manager to generate a 20-character password and stored it in a file encrypted with TrueCrypt. However, the file became corrupted, and Michael lost access to his 43.6 BTC (worth about €4,000, or $5,300, in 2013).

“At that time, I was really paranoid with my security,” Michael said, laughing.

Initially, Grand, a famed hardware hacker known as “Kingpin,” turned Michael down. Grand had previously helped another crypto wallet owner recover access to $2 million in cryptocurrency by cracking the PIN to his Trezor wallet using complex hardware techniques. However, Michael’s case was different as it involved a software-based wallet.

The Turning Point

After being turned down by multiple cryptography specialists who told him there was no chance of retrieving his money, Michael approached Grand again last June. This time, Grand agreed to give it a try, teaming up with Bruno, a fellow hacker in Germany.

Grand and Bruno spent months reverse-engineering the version of RoboForm Michael had used in 2013. They discovered a flaw in the pseudo-random number generator used to create passwords in that version. The flaw made the passwords predictable if one knew the date, time, and other parameters used during the generation.

Cracking the Code

Michael couldn’t remember the exact date he created the password but knew it was around April 14, 2013. Grand and Bruno configured RoboForm to generate 20-character passwords with the same parameters from March 1 to April 20, 2013. They extended the time frame when the initial attempt failed and adjusted the parameters based on other passwords Michael had generated that year.