This is one of those cases where a seemingly small change brings a plethora of new possibilities to digital forensics. What DOES change though is the types and amounts of information can be accessed with the Microsoft Account password we’ve just recovered. This isn’t exactly new, since the same thing could be done to local Windows accounts a decade ago. Running a GPU-assisted attack on the password (using Elcomsoft Distributed Password Recovery or similar tool) allows quickly enumerating the passwords with a combination of dictionary and brute-force attacks, in many cases resulting in the recovery of the original plain-text password. The point is that we have finally laid our hands on something that can help us break into a major online authentication service, the Microsoft Account.įor that to happen, Elcomsoft System Recovery can export the locally cached hash to the user’s Microsoft Account password for offline recovery.
While the tool can reset Microsoft Account passwords to allow instant logins to otherwise locked accounts, this is not the point.
The recent update to one of our oldest tools, Elcomsoft System Recovery, brought long-overdue compatibility with Windows systems that sign in with online authentication via Microsoft Account.