Ubuntu Tips n Tricks

Thursday, November 18, 2010

How to Crack Password-protected Zip Files Using Linux

Posted: 18 Nov 2010 02:04 AM PST

How to Crack Password-protected Zip Files Using Linux: In case you or your friend has forgotten the password of your password-protected .zip file that may contain important documents, music, or non-porn movies, there is really no need to worry as there are plenty of password crackers available out there. If you are using Linux, I highly recommend you download and use FCrackZip.

FCrackZip is a simple, fast, free, and easy-to-use zip cracker that is similar to fzc and zipcrack. Partially written in assembler, it uses brute force or dictionary based attacks to find the password. Although you will need the Linux terminal to use FCrackZip, a simple command is actually required to crack the zip password.

If you are using any popular or major Linux distribution, FCrackZip should be available on the software repository, and you could download it using the package manager. You may also download the latest version from HERE.

Since I'm using Ubuntu, I quickly installed FCrackZip from the command line using this command:

$ sudo apt-get install fcrackzip

After installing FCrackZip, you can either use brute force or dictionary mode to crack the password.

Here is a sample FCrackZip command one-liner using brute force:

$ fcrackzip -v -b -p aaaaaa -u your_zip_file.zip

From the screenshot above, you will see that I've successfully cracked a password protected zip file using the brute force method. From my experience, it took around 30 minutes to find password, but it is worth the wait. That's about it. You may also see the manpage of FCrackZip for other options or for further documentation.

You may also like our post about hacking Windows administrator password using Linux.