Hey guys, serious question...

[Arbiter]

Does anybody have a MS word password breaker?

I have a word document I've forgot the password to and would rather like to get back in it.

So far, I've only managed to find demo versions of software which will break 3 letter passwords and no more and I know for a fact this password is eight characters.

I'm only like to use it once in my life so I'm loathe to shell out money to buy something I'm never going to use again.

It's an MS Word 8 document which I've been told aren't the easiest to crack (not like v7 and below anyway).

Can anyone help me?

There's some more Orange Juice for the man who can...

You can try a brute-force attack, but that's a little time consuming with Word documents.
I'll try to find something.

[CyberSurfer]

Check out http://www.appz.com. They have one for free.

[Arbiter]

I think a brute force attack is the only option really.

I've been looking for days for something that would do it, but have had no luck so far.

I hope you dig something up!

Thanks...

[Arbiter]

Cheers matey.

I'll have a look at that when I get home - it's not really something I should be playing with in work I suppose...

[Juan Carlos Rey]

I once read in a magazine that WORDPAD would open ANY Word document wether it had a password or not. Give it a try!

I found a little something...
This is a file from M$ that describes the format of Word 8 documnets.
http://www.wotsit.org/download.asp?f=word8.
Inside the ZIP you'll find a file: S62F20.HTM
It's the only file I found the word 'password' in.
Good luck!

[Arbiter]

Couldn't find anything that would do the trick on appz.com.

If I have to write something to bludgeon my way through a word documents protection myself I'm just going to cry...

[CyberSurfer]

Sorry, Arbiter, they've removed the utility since the last time I was there.

[CyberSurfer]

Check out

http://www.elcomsoft.com/aw97pr.html

It supports brute force and dictionary based "attacks".

[Arbiter]

Thanks for looking CyberSurfer, but it's only a demo that's available. 3 letters and no more.

Rats.

I don't want to buy it just to get in one document, but the stuff in the document's fairly important to me.

Well, this sure smells like a monkey!

[Guv]

I do not use MS Word (prefer Corel WordPerfect), but made up a Word Document and password protected it. MS Word apparently encrypts a document if you password protect it.

I tried using Wordpad and a few other Word Processors on the document. Wordpad could not open it (it reported an error). Could not open it with anything else.

I used the file viewer from Ztree. Except for the first line of text, it looked like garbage. When I removed the password, the Ztree viewer showed me intelligible text.

Since the file is encrypted, I would give up any approach other that hacking the password.

Have you checked the MicroSoft Site? They might be able to give you some help. I doubt that they would tell you how to beat a password, but they might let you send them the file and hack it for you.

Guv: What did the first line say?

[Juan Carlos Rey]

I´m sorry my trick worked only for Word 7 and before. But give a try to:

http://webdon.com/mso/

They claim they can crack any Office document, even Office 2000.

Also, check this site: http://www.pwcrack.com/word.htm on a explanation why is so difficult to crack a Word document.

Good Luck, and next time write your password down and save it in a secure place!