PIN Brute Force Attack

A PIN brute force attack is a type of attack that hackers can use to gain unauthorized access to a crypto wallet by guessing the correct PIN. In a PIN brute force attack, the hacker uses a computer program that automatically tries every possible combination of numbers until the correct PIN is found.

Cypherock provides users the ability to create a eight-digit alphanumeric PIN which provides a much bigger sample space compared to a numeric PIN. Even if an attacker were to be able to generate all possible PIN combinations, there are two main ways that Cypherock X1 users will be protected. Cypherock has implemented a proof-of-work lock system called the CyLock that locks the wallet for longer durations of time as more wrong attempts are made. You can learn more about Cypherock's brute force protection in detail through our github page.

Additionally, the PIN itself is never stored on the X1 Vault. If the user has set a PIN for a wallet, the Cryptographic part is first encrypted and then stored in the NVM of the STM32. The decryption is done using the first hash of the PIN. The security of PIN is unaffected by this behavior since the nonce for encryption is stored on the X1 cards. The nonce for encryption acts as salt for the encryption along with the hash of the PIN.