# MIT Kerberos Documentation

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# Addressing dictionary attack risks

Kerberos initial authentication is normally secured using the client principal’s long-term key, which for users is generally derived from a password. Using a pasword-derived long-term key carries the risk of a dictionary attack, where an attacker tries a sequence of possible passwords, possibly requiring much less effort than would be required to try all possible values of the key. Even if password policy objects are used to force users not to pick trivial passwords, dictionary attacks can sometimes be successful against a significant fraction of the users in a realm. Dictionary attacks are not a concern for principals using random keys.

A dictionary attack may be online or offline. An online dictionary attack is performed by trying each password in a separate request to the KDC, and is therefore visible to the KDC and also limited in speed by the KDC’s processing power and the network capacity between the client and the KDC. Online dictionary attacks can be mitigated using account lockout. This measure is not totally satisfactory, as it makes it easy for an attacker to deny access to a client principal.

An offline dictionary attack is performed by obtaining a ciphertext generated using the password-derived key, and trying each password against the ciphertext. This category of attack is invisible to the KDC and can be performed much faster than an online attack. The attack will generally take much longer with more recent encryption types (particularly the ones based on AES), because those encryption types use a much more expensive string-to-key function. However, the best defense is to deny the attacker access to a useful ciphertext. The required defensive measures depend on the attacker’s level of network access.

An off-path attacker has no access to packets sent between legitimate users and the KDC. An off-path attacker could gain access to an attackable ciphertext either by making an AS request for a client principal which does not have the +requires_preauth flag, or by making a TGS request (after authenticating as a different user) for a server principal which does not have the -allow_svr flag. To address off-path attackers, a KDC administrator should set those flags on principals with password-derived keys:

    kadmin: add_principal +requires_preauth -allow_svr princname

An attacker with passive network access (one who can monitor packets sent between legitimate users and the KDC, but cannot change them or insert their own packets) can gain access to an attackable ciphertext by observing an authentication by a user using the most common form of preauthentication, encrypted timestamp. Any of the following methods can prevent dictionary attacks by attackers with passive network access:

- Enabling SPAKE preauthentication (added in release 1.17) on the KDC, and ensuring that all clients are able to support it.
- Using an HTTPS proxy for communication with the KDC, if the attacker cannot monitor communication between the proxy server and the KDC.
- Using FAST, protecting the initial authentication with either a random key (such as a host key) or with anonymous PKINIT.

An attacker with active network access (one who can inject or modify packets sent between legitimate users and the KDC) can try to fool the client software into sending an attackable ciphertext using an encryption type and salt string of the attacker’s choosing. Any of the following methods can prevent dictionary attacks by active attackers:

- Enabling SPAKE preauthentication and setting the disable_encrypted_timestamp variable to `true` in the [realms] subsection of the client configuration.
- Using an HTTPS proxy as described above, configured in the client’s krb5.conf realm configuration. If KDC discovery is used to locate a proxy server, an active attacker may be able to use DNS spoofing to cause the client to use a different HTTPS server or to not use HTTPS.
- Using FAST as described above.

If PKINIT or OTP are used for initial authentication, the principal’s long-term keys are not used and dictionary attacks are usually not a concern.