How would someone do this

[Hellfire]

I've always uses 18-15 (depending on the site ect) random letters/didgits for my passwords on hotmail/gmail/various forums, now how would someone find this out as I've had my forum password hacked, my gmail password hacked and various others, I've changed them now but how would they do this, I know it's not permitted talk but some insight into how these ****wits do this would be much appriciated or if it is un-appropriate i am sorry,

 

[nomav6]

Im guessing its someone that knows you, since they hacked more then just one of yours, so more then likely they used a keylogger or something to that affect, check and see what all programs your running, also have you used a public computer to log onto these sites any lately?

 

[Hellfire]

Nope.. no public computer, also my firewall asks me before anything is used/data is sent out on the net, but I just got told this, any truth in it?

nah i spoofed an e-mail from thesite boards to his hotmail
with a link to a thread
he clicks, nabs the website's cookie,
gets his password in encrypted form, i log in, reset the password send the reminder to his hotmail yada yada

 

[Praetor]

1. Any password can be broken by sheer luck or more commonly brute force. Just because it's 15 characters long doesnt mean its unbreakable so be aware of that (case in point: broke my buddies system password back in highschool which was 23 characters simply by educated guessing)

2. The simplest way is to use a keystroke recorder or even a camera.

 

[Lorand]

I can open a Samsonite lock in no time (the code-digits are full of dust because the case stays open most of the time).
Anyway, there's no code that couldn't be broken (it's just a matter of time).

 

[Hellfire]

yeah i know that but 6-15 random letters or numbers like

2grk3btuj3545ldf for example..not excatly an educated guess