How are WPA2 passwords encoded?

Question

I'm trying to figure out a good John The Ripper rule for WPA2 that won't waste time testing impossible passwords. Thus the question - are there any limits on what's allowed in a WPA2 password? Can it be any binary string or are we limited to ASCII or a particular encoding? Is its length any limited? I remember that there's a minimum password length limit.

score 4 · Answer 1 · answered Jun 28 '16 at 06:07

4

According to the 802.11i-2004 specification (link to download 802.11i-2004 pdf):

A pass-phrase is a sequence of between 8 and 63 ASCII-encoded characters. The limit of 63 comes from the desire to distinguish between a pass-phrase and a PSK displayed as 64 hexadecimal characters.

answered Jun 28 '16 at 06:07

Bubble Hacker

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Thanks. This means that I can throw away all diacritic symbols? – d33tah Jun 28 '16 at 06:36
That is correct! @d33tah – Bubble Hacker Jun 28 '16 at 06:43

How are WPA2 passwords encoded?

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