is this allowable?

[Crash893]

I have a friends netgear router

he ran into some trouble because he is computer "challenged" and had geek squad come out and set up a wep password for him which he of course lost


well everything was fine for about a year until his daughter got a new laptop for xmas and now no one knows what the wep key is.

I came over to try to figure it but of course there is a password on the config page as well


my question is would it be acceptable to ask for help to make a password guesser for the INTERNAL web config page?

the user name never changes its always admin and the password isn't case sensitive so it should go through pretty quickly


and just for background the reason i don't simply hit the reset button on the router is because i don't want to mess with the 4 other laptops that the family has because i will then have been the "last one to screw around on it" and any problems will of course come straight to me.

[sevenhalo]

and just for background the reason i don't simply hit the reset button on the router is because i don't want to mess with the 4 other laptops that the family has because i will then have been the "last one to screw around on it" and any problems will of course come straight to me.

Setting up a router is one of the easiest things you can do. Building an application to brute force attack one is... Well, if you don't know how to set one up; beating one down isn't a good substitute.

If you have questions on how to set it up, then shoot. But I don't think a brute force attack (or any means for password recovery regardless of intent) would be considered acceptable.

[Crash893]

I know how to set up a router i do it all the time

I just would rather not touch laptops if im not being paid for it


also seeings how i would like to learn more programing it seems a natural progression to use programing to help me out with a problem i have

[rory]

Cant you just log into the router and change the key?
If not, you could just reset the router to defaults?

[Crash893]

cant you just read the post

the reasons are explained why that is not the best option

[sevenhalo]

The first thing to learn about programming is always use the right tool for the right job. A program is not needed here.

Beyond that, even if your intent is good; what about other people who come across the site and misuse the code? You're basically asking us to write you a cracker for every war driver out there.

[Atheist]

This happened to me once with my netgear router...I finally remembered the password though
Have you checked Netgears website? They might have some tips n hints in the support area.

[rory]

You really have no choice other than to reset, but let them do it.

[penagate]

cant you just read the post

the reasons are explained why that is not the best option

Write down the settings BEFORE resetting it then.

[Atheist]

Write down the settings BEFORE resetting it then.

He cant see the settings if he doesnt have the password for the config page

[penagate]

A most excellent point.

[Crash893]

The first thing to learn about programming is always use the right tool for the right job. A program is not needed here.

Beyond that, even if your intent is good; what about other people who come across the site and misuse the code? You're basically asking us to write you a cracker for every war driver out there.

1) how is a program not the right tool, I need something to do alot of mindless work fast

2) even if some one did use my code they would have to have internal access to the router which would mean that it would be compromised already ( because you could just hit the reset button)

[rory]

Most routers will only allow 2 or 3 tries though. So you would need to make it wait for a little while between those timeouts, change the headers also.

[Crash893]

not the netgear I'm working on

I also fully understand that there are going to be millions and millions of posiblitys


but if i can test a few thousand a second then mabey ill get lucky


if it had a 3 strikes rule or a time between trys i wouldnt even bother becuase the time it would take to even test 100 would be out of the quesiton,

[Crash893]

Im not sure what the pesudo code would be to make the loop "roll over" like an odometer

i made a string array with a-z0-9

and i can count through the array till i get to 9

but then i have trouble getting it to go to aa ab ac

so on any hints

[Crash893]

no one?

[litlewiki]

Tried googling? Someone out there must have been in a similar situation and found a solution.

[Crash893]

I have been googleing for about 3 days now

I havent found anything that strikes me as a solution

[Al42]

The best solution, and I've had to fix this "problem" many times, is to reset the router, set it up properly, reset all the computers in the LAN to work properly, write down ALL the router settings and tape the paper with the settings to the bottom of the router case. Then the problem will never again come up for that router.

Brute forcing the password could take weeks of computer time.

[Andrew G]

Have you tried the default wep key for the router? I believe its
a1 b2 c3 d4 e5