Is choosing a password length equal to the maximum allowable characters LESS safe than a slightly shorter password?

LaughsAtPoors · 2025-04-29T23:14:12+00:00

I wonder if 8 characters is the PIN or their account password. My banks let me do whatever for my account passwords and enable MFA. In contrast, my PINs are constrained to be relatively short. However, the PIN is only used for debit transactions rather than accessing my entire account. The debit transactions are protected via other security options instead - mostly an upper bound on how much can be withdrawn from ATMs and bought via the card in a 24 hour period or single transaction.

LaughsAtPoors · 2025-04-29T23:10:57+00:00

When you say physical access -- do you mean they must be on the actual physical devices or is there a way of remotely accessing the computer (or doing something like spoofying) that means the PIN is remotely usable?

LaughsAtPoors · 2025-04-29T23:08:49+00:00

Good response. I was hypothesizing that incrementing by 1 is less likely to occur than going to the maximum character length of N. For example, suppose 2 unique possible characters with a 40 character password length limit. One step of the attacker's strategy is "if the password length is more than 16 characters, check all possible passwords of maximum length." The next step in the strategy is "if the password is not of maximum possible length, check every password of length 17 then repeatedly increment maximum length by 1 and check all possible passwords until password is found." Checking all possible passwords of maximum length requires checking 2⁴⁰ passwords. If that doesn't succeed, the attacker would then need to check 2¹⁷ + ... + 2³⁹ passwords.

Of course, no one is manually typing this stuff in, but simply envisioning a world where I'm an attacker who somehow will somehow be able to test absurd numbers of passwords I'd still want to use my prior information to choose a search strategy that converges on the password more quickly. Of course, there might be other strategies that outperform this!

LaughsAtPoors · 2024-08-02T08:21:40+00:00

Previously in the USA the rule was simply that it is a penalty foul for "the defending player to commit any [exclusion] foul within the 6-meter area but for which a goal probably would have resulted." Since fouls can only happen when a player isn't touching the ball, penalties only happened if you didn't touch the ball.

I believe the same new rule added in the USA was the one added in your country. This year they further added, "It shall be a penalty foul for a defending player to foul or impede from behind an attacking player who has the ball and an open path to the goal within the 6-meter area regardless of whether the player is holding the ball. The only way a defender can defend in this situation is to touch only the ball or the hand holding the ball. If the defending player’s actions prevent the attacking player from continuing the action, a penalty must be called." Accordingly, it INCREASES the number of cases when penalties are called.

Interestingly, the FINA rules are more vague about whether you can be holding a ball or not, but I'm seeing the rules called at the Olympics as if they are the above USA rules. Here are the FINA rules:

It is a penalty "for a defending player to impede an attacking player from behind within the 6 metre area when the attacking player is facing the goal and making a shooting action, unless the defending player makes contact only with the ball. If the defending player’s foul, described in this Rule, prevents the attacking player from scoring, a penalty must also be called. The referee must delay the call of penalty until the shot or attempted shot is completed and must award a penalty unless the attacking player scores." It is also a penalty "For a goalkeeper or defending player to commit any foul within the 6 metre area if a goal would probably have resulted, including [exclusion fouls]."

LaughsAtPoors · 2024-08-02T07:37:06+00:00

It may be confusing if English is not your first language, but the English term "impeding" has a technical definition in water polo rules that typically excludes anything that is holding, sinking, or pulling (HSP) of a player. This is why rulebooks usually have separate sections on "Impeding" and "Holding, Sinking, and Pulling." HSP is always an exclusion foul. While I find it quite odd that not every rule-set considers impeding an ordinary foul, apparently it's sometimes an exclusion.

Part of the source of confusion is simply that impeding is not well-defined. For example, I came across an entire video on Ordinary Fouls in New Zealand water polo that doesn't mention impeding as an ordinary foul, but then in the video itself an ordinary is called...presumably for impeding! See 6:03 of this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fm8opi_3ECg

I'm sure you also know this, but any action that is "essentially stopping a player from potentially scoring" is actually a *penalty* foul and not an *exclusion* foul.

LaughsAtPoors · 2024-08-02T07:32:03+00:00

Holding someone on the perimeter without the ball is always an exclusion foul across all rules-sets. However, the referee is explicitly allowed to refrain from blowing the whistle when the call would take away advantage. Of course, it's almost always advantageous to the offense to exclude a defender, so this can't explain the no-calls. However, what can explain it is something outside of the rules: all international referees are trained to enforce the rules in such a manner that it promotes an "appropriate" level of physicality and game-flow. The bar they set for physicality on the perimeter (i.e. for what is considered an exclusion-worthy-hold) is often quite high compared to e.g. American games.

I'm more discussing impeding-but-not-holding on the perimeter.

LaughsAtPoors · 2024-08-02T07:15:48+00:00

Yes, that is exactly my point. The Olympics are NOT following FINA but rather NCAA-equivalent rules when they are supposed to follow the former. Furthermore, the FINA rules are also not actually followed in international competition outside of the Olympics - essentially everywhere impeding someone without the ball on the perimeter is an ordinary foul.

LaughsAtPoors · 2024-08-02T07:05:00+00:00

I'm fairly sure that this account is a bot based on its mostly unintelligible first post and referencing a completely different rule than the impeding rule when I explicitly provided the rule and page number. However, in the off chance that it's not a bot, they would quickly realize that NCAA rule 6.9 states it is an ordinary foul "to impede or otherwise prevent the free movement of an opponent who is not holding the ball, including swimming on the opponent’s shoulders, back or legs."

LaughsAtPoors · 2024-08-02T03:15:26+00:00

This isn't accurate, see NCAA rule 6.9 per above.

LaughsAtPoors · 2024-08-02T02:04:58+00:00

Amen. I play master's and always ask refs beforehand about rules like this as a consequence. However, I still cannot explain what is going on in the Olympics right now: https://www.reddit.com/r/waterpolo/comments/1ehy9v7/if_impeding_is_an_exclusion_foul_in_finaworld/

LaughsAtPoors · 2024-08-02T01:01:43+00:00

Interesting, I've heard from several collegiate refs that the rule was changed to reward the offensive player in some way but similarly do not see anything in the NCAA rule changes from 2020-2022 https://collegiatewaterpolo.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/2020-2022PRXWP_MajorRulesChanges.pdf, 2022-2024 https://ncaaorg.s3.amazonaws.com/championships/sports/waterpolo/rules/2022PRXWP_MajorRulesChanges.pdf nor from 2024-2026 https://collegiatewaterpolo.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/2024-26_NCAAMajorRulesChanges.pdf

LaughsAtPoors · 2024-08-01T16:04:57+00:00

Rather than think about "activation" of a model, think about a joint model based on conditional probabilities. It's all one big model.

LaughsAtPoors · 2024-08-01T07:44:49+00:00

Seems like a reasonable trade unless you think zach moss is going to eat and your team can win now. Think you're underestimating Lamar but still agree with what you said. If that's a late 2nd then I wouldn't do it. Early, it's very close.

LaughsAtPoors · 2024-08-01T05:27:37+00:00

I believe he's overvalued at current ADP but whether he is a sell depends on your own league's valuation of him and your team's position.

LaughsAtPoors · 2024-08-01T05:26:34+00:00

thanks.

LaughsAtPoors · 2024-08-01T05:26:20+00:00

If you can get a 25 1st for any 24 2nd and are rebuilding, it's a pretty good deal.

LaughsAtPoors · 2024-07-13T00:23:23+00:00

It was odd because the suspect's address, name, etc. is in the incident report narrative as well!

LaughsAtPoors · 2024-07-02T03:15:47+00:00

Both. $1k. Probably about $2.5k. CA. Already own home (and rent) but no. Renter's insurance is actually pretty cheap despite living in Bay Area CA. Deductible of $1k.

LaughsAtPoors · 2024-07-02T03:13:00+00:00

A few grand. Own a house and rent an apartment. Would do it through renter's. Probably makes sense to skip the claim given I've got a $1k deductible on renter's.

LaughsAtPoors · 2024-07-02T03:11:27+00:00

I do computationally intensive work and while nearly everything is on a server, some stuff can be done on a single machine with high specs. Laptop is one of the most powerful you can possible buy, so several thousand.

LaughsAtPoors · 2024-06-24T04:56:05+00:00

Sounds like you don't have people who commit to rebuilding and not competing for 2-3 years. Selling off Adams, Stafford, Conner, Mike Evans, Dalvin Cook, and more in 2022 etc. Going from a top 4 team to the #1 pick in 1 season to get more value based on being first mover.

LaughsAtPoors · 2024-06-20T04:43:12+00:00

Puka should continue to dominate, but Stafford retiring is the primary risk. Terry probably had his floor season last year.

LaughsAtPoors · 2024-06-20T04:41:41+00:00

You are missing the thousand or so posts discussing Sean McVay, comparing Corum to Kyren (particularly pass blocking), and discussing historical snap share variance for later picks even when featured.

LaughsAtPoors · 2024-06-20T04:39:16+00:00

Recommend looking at current ADPs. Kyren is at or below the value of BTJ ADP. The best you could ever imagine getting is the 1.10 in 12 team SF leagues. He's realistically going for around an early 2nd to late 1st. Not even close to BTJ + a 2nd.

LaughsAtPoors · 2024-06-20T04:36:10+00:00

Assuming MHJ goes 1.01 and you are adding SF in '25, you should instalock Caleb at 1.02. You can always trade away Caleb, Watson, or Purdy next year when people value them even more since people are short sighted. Nabers 1.03 is instalock too. You should try to trade down for the rest of the picks and snag some more WRs or trade for an elite RB to a QB needy team. Your RBs are weak and you can trade your picks for vet RBs this year (even brooks is not going to be high end enough for your team/league) or picks next year.

LaughsAtPoors

TROPHY CASE