As some Microsoft Operating System geeks know, you can type many more characters than are on a standard keyboard by
using the ALT+NUMPAD combination technique.
For example, by holding down the ALT key, typing 234 on the number pad, then
releasing ALT gives you the O character. I'm writing this article mostly
because when I search around for information on the topic of ALT+Number key combos I find pages that are lacking
in details. Most of the pages I found are coming from the angle of using ALT+NUMPAD combinations as shortcuts for typing in
non-English languages, but I have another use for them. Using ALT+NUMPAD can make for some very ugly passwords to
crack. These odd characters have two major advantages over normal keystrokes:


1. They are unlikely to be in someone's
dictionary or brute force list. Try brute forcing a password like "ace of
?s" or "I am the a and the O".
2. Some hardware key loggers will not log
these odd characters. Your mileage may vary on this as some key loggers can, so
don't rely on it to keep you 100% safe.

I'll cover the 2nd point more in an upcoming article. Using ALT+NUMPAD to type odd characters into your password
also has a few disadvantages.


1. The way they are described in this article
only works in Microsoft Operating Systems (DOS, Windows 9x, Vista, XP, 2000),
and there may be some variation amongst the different versions. If you know of
a good way to do the same thing in Linux please email me.
2. Not all applications will let you use
these odd characters. For testing I tried the password "Oÿ" (ALT+234
and ALT+0255) on a Windows XP local account,, but not all application will let
you use these sorts of characters in your password.

Microsoft has the following to say on the subject of ALT+NUM key codes:


From:http://www.microsoft.com/globaldev/reference/glossary.mspx



Alt+Numpad: A method of entering characters by typing in the character’s
decimal code with the Numeric Pad keys (Num Lock turned on). In Windows:


• Alt+<xxx>, where xxx is the decimal value of
a code point, generates an OEM-encoded character.
• Alt+<0xxx>, where xxx is the decimal value of a code point, generates a
Windows-encoded character.
• Alt+<+>+<xxxx>, where xxxx is the hexadecimal Unicode code point,
generates a Unicode-encoded (UTF-16) character.



Shortly I'll explain explain the first two methods further. The 3rd is more
problematic to work with. First, you may have to edit your registry and add a
the REG_SZ value "HKEY_Current_User/Control Panel/Input
Method/EnableHexNumpad", then set it to "1". Also, depending on
where you are trying to type the character the application may interpret your
hexadecimal Fs as attempts to bring down the file menu. Since method three is
so problematic I'll focus on the first two methods.
First, make sure you are using the number pad and not the top roll number
keys, only the number pad works for this. Second, make sure NUM LOCK is on. It
does not have to be on in all cases for these key combos to work, but it helps
by keeping the number pad from being misinterpreted.

The chart from the site shows the relevant key
codes to get various symbols. The table on the left shows the OEM Extended
ASCII character set (AKA: IBM PC Extended Character Set; Extended ASCII; High
ASCII; 437 U.S.
English). True ASCII is only 7 bit, so the range is 0 to 127. IBM extended it
to 8 bits and added more characters. To type these characters you merely have
to hold down an ALT key, type the numeric value of the character, then release
the ALT key.

The table on the right shows the ANSI character set (AKA: Window's ANSI/ISO
Latin-1/ANSI Extended ASCII, though technically they are not exactly the same
thing.). To use the ANSI character set you do the same thing as the OEM set,
but you preface the number with an extra zero. Notice that the first 127 should
be the same in both sets, though values 0-31 may not be viewable in all cases.
I've been in "character encoding hell" just trying to get this
article on my site in a readable format.

For example, ALT+257 gives me a in Wordpad, but
in Notepad it loops back around the character set and gives me?(257-256=1 which
is ? in the OEM set) . If you want to know what key code will bring up a
particular character in a certain Windows font run Windows Character Map
(charmap.exe) and look in the bottom right corner to find out.

some examples :

ALT+130 é
ALT+131 â
ALT+132 ä
ALT+133 à
ALT+134 å
ALT+135 ç
ALT+136 ê
ALT+137 ë
ALT+138 è
ALT+139 ï
ALT+140 î
ALT+141 ì
ALT+142 Ä
ALT+143 Å
ALT+144 É
ALT+145 æ
ALT+146 Æ
ALT+147 ô
ALT+148 ö
ALT+149 ò
ALT+150 û
ALT+151 ù
ALT+152 ÿ
ALT+153 Ö
ALT+154 Ü
ALT+155 ¢
ALT+156 £
ALT+157 ¥
ALT+158 P
ALT+159 ƒ
ALT+160 á
ALT+161 í
ALT+162 ó
ALT+163 ú
ALT+164 ñ
ALT+165 Ñ
ALT+166 ª
ALT+167 º
ALT+168 ¿
ALT+169 ¬

From

Chief Admin

Ismail Shah