How Does Navicat Encrypt Password?

1. What is Navicat?

• Navicat is a series of graphical database management and development software produced by PremiumSoft CyberTech Ltd. for MySQL, MariaDB, Oracle, SQLite, PostgreSQL and Microsoft SQL Server.

• It has an Explorer-like graphical user interface and supports multiple database connections for local and remote databases. Its design is made to meet the needs of a variety of audiences, from database administrators and programmers to various businesses/companies that serve clients and share information with partners.

2. What does indicate that Navicat encrypts password?

• If you use Navicat to manage one of your databases, the first thing you should do is to create a connection to the database. So that means you should fill textboxes on the window showed below with the database's information like host name, User name, Password and so on.

  

• If you check "Save Password", after you click "Ok" button, Navicat will encrypt the password and then save the connection configuration, containing encrypted password, in Windows Registry. The exact path is showed below:

  Database Type	Path
  MySQL	HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\PremiumSoft\Navicat\Servers\<your connection name>
  MariaDB	HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\PremiumSoft\NavicatMARIADB\Servers\<your connection name>
  Microsoft SQL	HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\PremiumSoft\NavicatMSSQL\Servers\<your connection name>
  Oracle	HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\PremiumSoft\NavicatOra\Servers\<your connection name>
  PostgreSQL	HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\PremiumSoft\NavicatPG\Servers\<your connection name>
  SQLite	HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\PremiumSoft\NavicatSQLite\Servers\<your connection name>

• Here blow is an example:

  

3. How does Navicat encrypt password?

Navicat use blowfish algorithm to encrypt password string. Here below is what Navicat did:

1. Generate Key.

• Navicat use SHA-1 algorithm to generate a 160-bits' key.

• The SHA-1 digest of an ASCII string---"3DC5CA39", 8 bytes long---is the key used in blowfish cipher.

• The exact value is:

  unsigned char Key[20] = {
      0x42, 0xCE, 0xB2, 0x71, 0xA5, 0xE4, 0x58, 0xB7,
      0x4A, 0xEA, 0x93, 0x94, 0x79, 0x22, 0x35, 0x43,
      0x91, 0x87, 0x33, 0x40
  };

2. Initialize Initial Vector(IV)

• We know that blowfish algorithm could only encrypt an 8-bytes-long block every time.

• At the beginning, Navicat fills an 8-bytes-long block with 0xFF, then uses blowfish algorithm encrypt the block by the key mentioned above. After that the 8-bytes-long block is Initial Vector(IV).

• The exact value of IV is:

  unsigned char IV[8] = {
      0xD9, 0xC7, 0xC3, 0xC8, 0x87, 0x0D, 0x64, 0xBD
  };

3. Encrypt Password String.

• NOTICE: Here, the password string is an ASCII string, and we DO NOT consider the "NULL" terminator.

• Navicat use a pipeline to encrypt password string. The pipeline is showed below:

  

• NOTICE: Every plaintext block is an 8-bytes-long block. Only when the last plaintext block is not 8-bytes-long, will the last step showed in the picture above be executed. Otherwise, the last step is just like the middle two steps.

4. Store The Encrypted Password.

• The encrypted password stored in Windows Registry is the join of hex strings of every cipher blocks.

5. Addition: Password Encryption In NCX file.

1. What is NCX file?

• NCX file is Navicat Connection eXport file. When you export your connections' configuration for backup, Navicat will generate it. If you choose to export passwords, the encrypted passwords will be stored in NCX file you get.

2. Encryption Algorithm.

• Navicat 11 and Navicat 12 use different algorithm to encrypt password.

• In Navicat 11, the encryption algorithm used is exactly the same with what I said before.

• In Navicat 12, the encryption algorithm is AES128/CBC/PKCS7Padding, where the key is:

  unsigned char AES_Key[16] = {
      'l', 'i', 'b', 'c', 'c', 'k', 'e', 'y',
      'l', 'i', 'b', 'c', 'c', 'k', 'e', 'y'
  };

  and initial vector is:

  unsigned char AES_IV[16] = {
      'l', 'i', 'b', 'c', 'c', 'i', 'v', ' ',
      'l', 'i', 'b', 'c', 'c', 'i', 'v', ' '
  };

2. How to use the sample code.

• Please make sure that you have Python3.

• Please make sure that you have blowfish, pycryptodome module if you want to use NavicatCrypto.py and NavicatCryptoHelper.py. You can install blowfish and pycryptodome module by command:

  pip install blowfish

• Please make sure that you have 'pypiwin32' module if you want to use ShowNavicat.py. You can install 'pypiwin32' by command:

  pip install pypiwin32

• The following is a sample:

  1. NavicatCrypto.py

     PS E:\GitHub\how-does-navicat-encrypt-password\python3> python
     Python 3.6.3 (v3.6.3:2c5fed8, Oct  3 2017, 18:11:49) [MSC v.1900 64 bit (AMD64)] on win32
     Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
     >>> from NavicatCrypto import *
     >>> cipher = Navicat11Crypto()
     >>> cipher.EncryptString('This is a test')
     '0EA71F51DD37BFB60CCBA219BE3A'
     >>> cipher.DecryptString('0EA71F51DD37BFB60CCBA219BE3A')
     'This is a test'
     >>> cipher2 = Navicat12Crypto()
     >>> cipher2.EncryptStringForNCX('This is a test')
     'B75D320B6211468D63EB3B67C9E85933'
     >>> cipher2.DecryptStringForNCX('B75D320B6211468D63EB3B67C9E85933')
     'This is a test'
     >>>
     

  2. NavicatCryptoHelper.py

     PS E:\GitHub\how-does-navicat-encrypt-password\python3> .\NavicatCryptoHelper.py -e "This is a test"
     0EA71F51DD37BFB60CCBA219BE3A
     
     PS E:\GitHub\how-does-navicat-encrypt-password\python3> .\NavicatCryptoHelper.py -d "0EA71F51DD37BFB60CCBA219BE3A"
     This is a test
     
     PS E:\GitHub\how-does-navicat-encrypt-password\python3> .\NavicatCryptoHelper.py -e -ncx "This is a test"
     B75D320B6211468D63EB3B67C9E85933
     
     PS E:\GitHub\how-does-navicat-encrypt-password\python3> .\NavicatCryptoHelper.py -d -ncx "B75D320B6211468D63EB3B67C9E85933"
     This is a test
     
     PS E:\GitHub\how-does-navicat-encrypt-password\python3>

• You can just run ShowNavicat.py to get all of your database passwords that were stored by Navicat in Windows Registry.