help crack MS Word password!! *urgent*

I have a Microsoft Word document that I must edit immediately, but the person who sent it to me put a password on it (DUH!!). She's out of the office and I can't get a hold of her, and I'll miss a scholarship deadline if I don't edit this on time. Anybody know how to crack a password protected document?

Thanks!


Disclaimer: I have full authorization to edit the file. I have no clue why she put a password protection on a document that we were still working on /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/Christo_pull_hair.gif

Did I mention free software would be preferred?

pm sent

check your PM.

Edit: lol, damnit, someone beat me to it.

he needs all the help he can get /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif he's not responding yet to pm's

sorry guys, I'm on dial-up right now. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif onto PM

think I got it... pm/email sent

password sent
check email.

l33t hax0r sk1ll5

*flex*

/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smirk.gif

lol
1337 AOPR 3.03 Pro skillz.
^^^^
last 4 digits of my cellie : )

used to be in the cracking group VARiANCE. heh.

Leon

cool.. I'm a sys adm and run into this kind of thing all the time. I'm about 26 miles N of you Leeoniya.

that's wierd. what's even stranger is that we registered at about the same time and have almost the same number of posts.

*queue twightlight zone music*

Its really that easy to break MS Word and Excel passwords?

Why do they even bother having this function is its easy to crack.

Is there a way to password protect Excel or Word documents more securely??

Not really no. My thumbdrive has a suite of tools from when I was a Technician that covers passwords cracking for most major programs I keep windows password removal cd's in the car and WinPE based disks for getting to files on the few systems that cant be booted up. Passwords are very much like locks, in that they are really about keeping honest people honest, and with the right tools and knowledge anything is possible.

Thomas

any sort of public-key private-key encryption like RSA or PGP. where the document is encrypted using a private key and can only be decrypted using a matching public key that cannot be feasibly reversed even if the algorith is known, given limited resources. (time and processing speed)

algorithms that dont depend on one-way math functions and are embedded into dlls of every copy of office distibuted is hardly an irreversible or secure way to protect files.

Leon

Old versions of Word passwords are easy to crack. Newer ones are much harder but still doable. www.crak.com has some commercial tools for it.

fluorescent and Leoniya, you are my heroes! I had to take a break from writing, but I'm back on the computer now (not quite working on what I should be, as you can see /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif). Thank you both so much for your help. Cheers to you two!!