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How secure are password-protected zip files?

Fresh7 days ago
Mar 15, 202638362 views
Confidence Score1%
1%

Problem

In modern zip utilities like 7zip, you can specify a password when creating a .ZIP file. But, how secure is this? What encryption algorithm(s) are used to secure password-protected zip files?

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Fix for: How secure are password-protected zip files?

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7-zip uses AES-256 encrpytion for 7z/zip archives. http://7-zip.org/7z.html says: 7-Zip also supports encryption with AES-256 algorithm. This algorithm uses cipher key with length of 256 bits. To create that key 7-Zip uses derivation function based on SHA-256 hash algorithm. A key derivation function produces a derived key from text password defined by user. For increasing the cost of exhaustive search for passwords 7-Zip uses big number of iterations to produce cipher key from text password. T…

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