During a test, you find a hash that starts with '$2y$10$' followed by 53 characters. You need to crack it. Which hash type is this and which Hashcat mode should you use?

SHA-512 crypt; Hashcat mode 1800

An organization wants to mitigate pass-the-hash attacks in their Active Directory environment. Which control is most effective?

Enforce a 15-character password policy

Disable NTLM authentication entirely

Enable Credential Guard and use the Protected Users group

Use a salted hash algorithm for domain accounts

Your organization stores user passwords as unsalted MD5 hashes. A recent breach exposed the hash database, and attackers quickly cracked many passwords. You need to recommend a more secure storage method. Which option provides the best defense against offline cracking?

Use a strong, unique salt for each password and a slow key-derivation function like bcrypt.

Use a simple encryption scheme with a hardcoded key.

Use a single global salt with SHA-256 hashing.

Use unsalted SHA-512 hashes instead of MD5.

An organization is migrating from unsalted MD5 to a new password storage scheme. They want to minimize the risk of offline cracking while maintaining reasonable login performance. Which approach is best?

Use salted SHA-256 with 1000 iterations

Use bcrypt with a cost factor of 12

GIAC Penetration Tester (GPEN)

Domain 3Objective 3

Attacking Password Hashes GPEN Practice Questions (Page 2)

Part of the Password Attacks and Credential Attacks domain, which makes up ~28% of our current practice bank. GIAC (SANS) does not publish an official question count, but from its 180-minute exam (~70–120 total, ~20–34 in this domain), expect 5–9 from this objective — we provide 31 practice questions to prepare you well beyond it. (estimate)

31questions here

7free pages

7concepts

Questions 6–10

6foundation · easy
Which John the Ripper option specifies a wordlist file for dictionary-based password cracking?
Select an answer first
7application · easy
During a test, you find a hash that starts with '$2y$10$' followed by 53 characters. You need to crack it. Which hash type is this and which Hashcat mode should you use?
Select an answer first
8application · medium
An organization wants to mitigate pass-the-hash attacks in their Active Directory environment. Which control is most effective?
Select an answer first
9application · medium
Your organization stores user passwords as unsalted MD5 hashes. A recent breach exposed the hash database, and attackers quickly cracked many passwords. You need to recommend a more secure storage method. Which option provides the best defense against offline cracking?
Select an answer first
10expert · hard
An organization is migrating from unsalted MD5 to a new password storage scheme. They want to minimize the risk of offline cracking while maintaining reasonable login performance. Which approach is best?
Select an answer first

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