From time to time, the open source/freeware community comes along with a product so simple and so frightening that it makes me smile. This is one that’s been around since 1997, but somehow I never stumbled across it.
A fine Norseman, Petter Nordahl-Hagen, wrote the first version of his Windows registry and password hacker back in 1997. He’s updated it continually over the years, and today the Offline NT Password & Registry Editor is available as a free download. (It works with Windows 2000 and Windows XP as well as Windows NT, so don’t let the name fool you.) The Web site includes an excellent FAQ and the source code, should you choose to confound yourself further.
Why is this frightening? Because after all the years of Microsoft touting security, there’s still a freelance programmer that can beat the billion dollar behemoth.