Wallet decryption via offline PIN brute force
Published Mar 3, 2023 · Updated Mar 7, 2025
Weak PIN protection in Streetside Samourai Wallet 0.99.96i allows local users to decrypt wallet data from a recovered samourai.dat file. PinEntryActivity derives the AES-256-CBC key from a plaintext device GUID plus a 5-to-8-digit PIN using only 15,000 PBKDF2-HMAC-SHA256 iterations, enabling offline enumeration. Access requires the app's private data file and stored GUID; successful cracking exposes the wallet passphrase and permits control of its funds.
Summary
What happened
Weak PIN protection in Streetside Samourai Wallet 0.99.96i allows local users to decrypt wallet data from a recovered samourai.dat file. PinEntryActivity derives the AES-256-CBC key from a plaintext device GUID plus a 5-to-8-digit PIN using only 15,000 PBKDF2-HMAC-SHA256 iterations, enabling offline enumeration. Access requires the app's private data file and stored GUID; successful cracking exposes the wallet passphrase and permits control of its funds.
The record
- CVE
- CVE-2021-36689
- Published
- Mar 3, 2023
- Updated
- Mar 7, 2025
- Vendor
- Unknown vendor
- Product
- Unknown product
- Classifications
- CWE-521, T1110.002
- Attack vector
- local
- Privileges
- authenticated
Timeline
How it unfolded
- Mar 3, 2023CVE publishedPublication date reported by the CVE source.
- Mar 7, 2025Record updatedLatest update available in the CVE record.
Exploitability
Present is not the same as exploitable
Compare your product and version with the public record. A matching version still requires validation against your environment.
Is a vulnerable build present?
What conditions does exploitation require?
What is affected?
Affected products and versions are unavailable in this record.
Attacks
What attackers are doing with it
Daily unique IPs observed by Shadowserver honeypots for known exploited vulnerabilities (KEVs). Missing observations do not establish an absence of attacks.
Weakness, pattern, technique
Public exploit references
- Offline Samourai PIN brute-force proof of conceptfunctional · demonstrated
Labels summarize the accepted research assessment. They do not indicate a test against your environment.
Technologies
Your stack
See the directory against your own environment.
Your stack
Check the software in your environment
Book a demo to see how Hinoki identifies affected software and validates exploitability in your environment.
Book a demo