At a glance, the passwords the LLMs created looked secure, much like those that a password generator might spit out. But that’s exactly where the problems arose: Although the AI-generated passwords appeared to be complex and safe to use for securing online accounts, they were actually quite predictable upon closer inspection.
All three LLMs exhibited clearly identifiable patterns in how they created these passwords. These patterns included repeated character strings, predictable password structure, frequent reuse of similar characters, clear biases toward certain numbers and letters, and even duplicate passwords in some cases. Although the AI-generated passwords looked random, they really weren’t. This could easily create a false sense of security if you were to use these predictable passwords for your online accounts.
Why does everything have to be LLM, like why cant things sometimes just be algorithmically generated like my AI-free password manager does?
I wonder if there’s AI-powered password managers on the market now lol. If so and if customers, I would mirror Zuck’s snide “thuh dumb fucks” setiment when people trusted him
ZXCVBN algorithm has never failed me. I can generate passwords that would take 1 quadrillion guesses/second hackers over 90 million years (testing 1 quad/sec) on the reg
It’s worse than just using a new tool though. By definition LLMs use the statistically most likely option (with minor variation for flavor). People are literally asking a statistics bot what password can I use that is the most likely?
I was gonna say that. They gonna give you a recycled pattern
I mean, like, what is an effective/“good” password if not an unrecycled non-pattern??
That’s a good point: it’s not just that LLMs fail to give you an optimal password, it’s that they’re inherently designed to give you a pessimal one.
But…but Magic Box™
I always say I’m not interested in asking an LLM to add 2 + 2 for me. Of course my managers are always pushing us to use LLMs and coworkers keep suggesting we replace efficient, testable, and consistent processes with AI. If you’re going to use it at least think of scenarios that are hard to code for and it would take you at least 10 min to solve.