There is a compatibility pack available for PHP versions 5.3.7 and later, so you don't have to wait on version 5.5 for using this function. It comes in form of a single php file:
https://github.com/ircmaxell/password_compat
(PHP 5 >= 5.5.0, PHP 7)
password_hash — Creates a password hash
$password
, integer $algo
[, array $options
] )password_hash() creates a new password hash using a strong one-way hashing algorithm. password_hash() is compatible with crypt(). Therefore, password hashes created by crypt() can be used with password_hash().
The following algorithms are currently supported:
PASSWORD_DEFAULT - Use the bcrypt algorithm (default as of PHP 5.5.0).
Note that this constant is designed to change over time as new and stronger algorithms are added
to PHP. For that reason, the length of the result from using this identifier can change over
time. Therefore, it is recommended to store the result in a database column that can expand
beyond 60 characters (255 characters would be a good choice).
PASSWORD_BCRYPT - Use the CRYPT_BLOWFISH algorithm to
create the hash. This will produce a standard crypt() compatible hash using
the "$2y$" identifier. The result will always be a 60 character string, or FALSE on failure.
Supported Options:
salt - to manually provide a salt to use when hashing the password. Note that this will override and prevent a salt from being automatically generated.
If omitted, a random salt will be generated by password_hash() for each password hashed. This is the intended mode of operation.
The salt option has been deprecated as of PHP 7.0.0. It is now preferred to simply use the salt that is generated by default.
cost - which denotes the algorithmic cost that should be used. Examples of these values can be found on the crypt() page.
If omitted, a default value of 10 will be used. This is a good baseline cost, but you may want to consider increasing it depending on your hardware.
passwordThe user's password.
Using the PASSWORD_BCRYPT as the
algorithm, will result
in the password parameter being truncated to a
maximum length of 72 characters.
algoA password algorithm constant denoting the algorithm to use when hashing the password.
optionsAn associative array containing options. See the password algorithm constants for documentation on the supported options for each algorithm.
If omitted, a random salt will be created and the default cost will be used.
Returns the hashed password, or FALSE on failure.
The used algorithm, cost and salt are returned as part of the hash. Therefore, all information that's needed to verify the hash is included in it. This allows the password_verify() function to verify the hash without needing separate storage for the salt or algorithm information.
Example #1 password_hash() example
<?php
/**
* We just want to hash our password using the current DEFAULT algorithm.
* This is presently BCRYPT, and will produce a 60 character result.
*
* Beware that DEFAULT may change over time, so you would want to prepare
* By allowing your storage to expand past 60 characters (255 would be good)
*/
echo password_hash("rasmuslerdorf", PASSWORD_DEFAULT)."\n";
?>
The above example will output something similar to:
$2y$10$.vGA1O9wmRjrwAVXD98HNOgsNpDczlqm3Jq7KnEd1rVAGv3Fykk1a
Example #2 password_hash() example setting cost manually
<?php
/**
* In this case, we want to increase the default cost for BCRYPT to 12.
* Note that we also switched to BCRYPT, which will always be 60 characters.
*/
$options = [
'cost' => 12,
];
echo password_hash("rasmuslerdorf", PASSWORD_BCRYPT, $options)."\n";
?>
The above example will output something similar to:
$2y$12$QjSH496pcT5CEbzjD/vtVeH03tfHKFy36d4J0Ltp3lRtee9HDxY3K
Example #3 password_hash() example setting salt manually
<?php
/**
* Note that the salt here is randomly generated.
* Never use a static salt or one that is not randomly generated.
*
* For the VAST majority of use-cases, let password_hash generate the salt randomly for you
*/
$options = [
'cost' => 11,
'salt' => mcrypt_create_iv(22, MCRYPT_DEV_URANDOM),
];
echo password_hash("rasmuslerdorf", PASSWORD_BCRYPT, $options)."\n";
?>
The above example will output something similar to:
$2y$11$q5MkhSBtlsJcNEVsYh64a.aCluzHnGog7TQAKVmQwO9C8xb.t89F.
Example #4 password_hash() example finding a good cost
<?php
/**
* This code will benchmark your server to determine how high of a cost you can
* afford. You want to set the highest cost that you can without slowing down
* you server too much. 8-10 is a good baseline, and more is good if your servers
* are fast enough. The code below aims for ≤ 50 milliseconds stretching time,
* which is a good baseline for systems handling interactive logins.
*/
$timeTarget = 0.05; // 50 milliseconds
$cost = 8;
do {
$cost++;
$start = microtime(true);
password_hash("test", PASSWORD_BCRYPT, ["cost" => $cost]);
$end = microtime(true);
} while (($end - $start) < $timeTarget);
echo "Appropriate Cost Found: " . $cost . "\n";
?>
The above example will output something similar to:
Appropriate Cost Found: 10
It is strongly recommended that you do not generate your own salt for this function. It will create a secure salt automatically for you if you do not specify one.
As noted above, providing the salt option in PHP 7.0 will generate a deprecation warning. Support for providing a salt manually may be removed in a future PHP release.
Note:
It is recommended that you test this function on your servers, and adjust the cost parameter so that execution of the function takes less than 100 milliseconds on interactive systems. The script in the above example will help you choose a good cost value for your hardware.
Note: Updates to supported algorithms by this function (or changes to the default one) must follow the following rules:
- Any new algorithm must be in core for at least 1 full release of PHP prior to becoming default. So if, for example, a new algorithm is added in 7.5.5, it would not be eligible for default until 7.7 (since 7.6 would be the first full release). But if a different algorithm was added in 7.6.0, it would also be eligible for default at 7.7.0.
- The default should only change in a full release (7.3.0, 8.0.0, etc) and not in a revision release. The only exception to this is in an emergency when a critical security flaw is found in the current default.
There is a compatibility pack available for PHP versions 5.3.7 and later, so you don't have to wait on version 5.5 for using this function. It comes in form of a single php file:
https://github.com/ircmaxell/password_compat
Pay close attention to the maximum allowed length of the password parameter! If you exceed the maximum length, it will be truncated without warning.
If you prepend your own salt/pepper to the password, and that salt/pepper exceeds the maximum length, then this function will truncate the actual password. That means password_verify() will return true with ANY password using the same salt/pepper.
It might be a good idea to append any salt/pepper to the end of the password instead.
I agree with martinstoeckli,
don't create your own salts unless you really know what you're doing.
By default, it'll use /dev/urandom to create the salt, which is based on noise from device drivers.
And on Windows, it uses CryptGenRandom().
Both have been around for many years, and are considered secure for cryptography (the former probably more than the latter, though).
Don't try to outsmart these defaults by creating something less secure. Anything that is based on rand(), mt_rand(), uniqid(), or variations of these is *not* good.
You can produce the same hash in php 5.3.7+ with crypt() function:
<?php
$salt = mcrypt_create_iv(22, MCRYPT_DEV_URANDOM);
$salt = base64_encode($salt);
$salt = str_replace('+', '.', $salt);
$hash = crypt('rasmuslerdorf', '$2y$10$'.$salt.'$');
echo $hash;
?>
For passwords, you generally want the hash calculation time to be between 250 and 500 ms (maybe more for administrator accounts). Since calculation time is dependent on the capabilities of the server, using the same cost parameter on two different servers may result in vastly different execution times. Here's a quick little function that will help you determine what cost parameter you should be using for your server to make sure you are within this range (note, I am providing a salt to eliminate any latency caused by creating a pseudorandom salt, but this should not be done when hashing passwords):
<?php
/**
* @Param int $min_ms Minimum amount of time in milliseconds that it should take
* to calculate the hashes
*/
function getOptimalBcryptCostParameter($min_ms = 250) {
for ($i = 4; $i < 31; $i++) {
$options = [ 'cost' => $i, 'salt' => 'usesomesillystringforsalt' ];
$time_start = microtime(true);
password_hash("rasmuslerdorf", PASSWORD_BCRYPT, $options);
$time_end = microtime(true);
if (($time_end - $time_start) * 1000 > $min_ms) {
return $i;
}
}
}
echo getOptimalBcryptCostParameter(); // prints 12 in my case
?>
In most cases it is best to omit the salt parameter. Without this parameter, the function will generate a cryptographically safe salt, from the random source of the operating system.
Note that this function can return NULL. It does so if you provide an incorrect constant as an algorythm. I had the following:
$password = password_hash($password1, PASSWORD_BDCRYPT, array( 'cost' => 10 ));
and i couldn't understand why i kept having NULL written in $password; it was a simple fact that the constant was PASSWORD_BCRYPT.
if you thought
"why is the salt included in the hash and is it save when i store it as it is in my db?"
Answer i found:
The salt just has to be unique. It not meant to be a secret.
As mentioned in notes and docu before: let password_hash() take care of the salt.
With the unique salt you force the attacker to crack the hash.
The hash is unique and cannot be found at rainbow tables.
Alan is entirely wrong, please ignore his comment and/or vote it down. This method encodes the algorithm and other parameters into the returned hash.
Deliberately specifying the algorithm to use should only be done in a carefully considered scenario, and these functions are designed and policies have been decided to ensure wide compatibility.
The risk of forcing a particular algorithm is that your code will continue to use a weaker algorithm as newer ones are implemented and strengthened.
Please note that password_hash will ***truncate*** the password at the first NULL-byte.
http://blog.ircmaxell.com/2015/03/security-issue-combining-bcrypt-with.html
If you use anything as an input that can generate NULL bytes (sha1 with raw as true, or if NULL bytes can naturally end up in people's passwords), you may make your application much less secure than what you might be expecting.
The password
$a = "\01234567";
is zero bytes long (an empty password) for bcrypt.
The workaround, of course, is to make sure you don't ever pass NULL-bytes to password_hash.
The PASSWORD_BCRYPT duration evolves exponentially based on COST.
Measure picture : https://static.lortet.io/files/php.net.bcrypt_evolves.png
The "constant" depends on your machine (for me is 1).
Method :
<table border="1">
<?php
for( $cost = 0; $cost <= 10; $cost=$cost+0.1){
$start = microtime(true);
password_hash("test".$cost, PASSWORD_BCRYPT, ["cost" => $cost]);
$end = microtime(true);
echo '<tr><td>' . $cost . '</td><td>' . ( $end - $start ) . '</td></tr>';
}
?>
</table>
For me it didn't work, so I asked my friend and he told me to remove ."/n"
So it worked like this
$password = password_hash($password, PASSWORD_DEFAULT);