John The Ripper

⚙️ Cracking Modes in John

🔹 Single Crack Mode

john --format=<hash_type> <hash_file>

Example:

john --format=sha256 hashes_to_crack.txt

• Uses internal wordlists and rules

• Saves results to ~/.john/john.pot

• View cracked passwords:

john --show hashes_to_crack.txt

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🔸 Wordlist Mode

john --wordlist=<wordlist.txt> --rules <hash_file>

• Applies word transformations

• Allows custom or multiple wordlists

• Often faster than brute-force

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🔺 Incremental Mode

john --incremental <hash_file>

• Tries every combo of defined charset (default: a-zA-Z0-9)

• Great for cracking unknown or complex passwords

• Very resource-intensive

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🗃️ Cracking Specific File Formats

John can crack password-protected files by using helper tools to extract hashes.

🔄 General Workflow

<tool> <file> > file.hash
john file.hash

# or with wordlist

john --wordlist=rockyou.txt file.hash

🔧 Supported Tools

Tool	Description
pdf2john	PDF password hashes
ssh2john	SSH private key hashes
mscash2john	MS Cache v2 hashes
keychain2john	macOS Keychain
rar2john	RAR file hashes
pfx2john	PKCS#12 hashes
truecrypt_volume2john	TrueCrypt
keepass2john	KeePass DB
zip2john	ZIP archives
office2john	MS Office docs
wpa2john	WPA/WPA2 handshakes

🔍 Find all available tools on pwnbox:

locate *2john*

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💬 Example Cracking Formats

Hash Type	Example Command
AFS	john --format=afs hashes.txt
BSDi	john --format=bsdi hashes.txt
LM	john --format=LM hashes.txt
NT	john --format=nt hashes.txt
MySQL	john --format=mysql hashes.txt
raw-md5	john --format=raw-md5 hashes.txt
SHA-256	john --format=raw-sha256 hashes.txt
PDF	john --format=pdf hashes.txt
ZIP	john --format=zip hashes.txt
WPA	john --format=wpa hashes.txt
Oracle	john --format=oracle hashes.txt
... many more ...

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🧪 Pro Tips

• 💡 Keep wordlists updated (e.g., SecLists)
• 🔄 Use multiple cracking modes for best results

• 🧠 Combine --rules with --wordlist for advanced cracking

• 🧾 Monitor progress with john --status or john --show

• 📁 Cracked passwords are stored in: ~/.john/john.pot