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I've inherited a migration project. The legacy database has PHPass encryption and the new database is MD5. Is it possible to "upgrade" from MD5 to PHPass and keep data integrity?

Sully
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  • MD5 is a hashing algorithm, not encryption. – user229044 Jul 30 '15 at 15:25
  • Do you mean to say that the _legacy_ system used MD5 and the _new one_ is built with PHPass? – Michael Berkowski Jul 30 '15 at 15:25
  • Hi @MichaelBerkowski no, the legacy system was Wordpress based so PHPass. The new system has 2 user databases, 1 of which the passwords are stored as PHPass, but the other which integrates with it uses MD5. That makes no sense to anyone, but I didn't build it! – Sully Jul 31 '15 at 16:52
  • @Sully It's really unclear what you're asking. Are you trying to move passwords from MD5 to PHPass, or vice versa? Your title and question body ask for *different things*. That said, neither is possible. – user229044 Jul 31 '15 at 17:30

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No. The whole point of hashes is that they are not reversible.

To "port" or "upgrade" a hash from MD5 to PHPass (or vice versa) you would need to reverse the MD5 hashing in order to pass the unhashed password into PHPass, which is impossible.

user229044
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  • Reversing MD5 IS possible because it's not secure - for example: http://md5.gromweb.com/ if it's possible in a single instance it SHOULD be possible in bulk – Sully Jul 31 '15 at 16:50
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    @Sully That's supremely silly. Read the site you've linked to - it simply maintains a huge database of millions of common passwords, with their known MD5 hash. That's not a fault or weakness in MD5, and it doesn't let you **reverse** MD5 hashes. – user229044 Jul 31 '15 at 17:21
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    @Sully And arguing that "if it's possible in single it should be possible in bulk" is incredibly naive. If it takes you a week to crack a single password, yes, it is **possible** to do it in bulk, it might just take you a thousand years. If that's what you consider "possible", then good luck to you. – user229044 Jul 31 '15 at 17:24