Why You Should Use Bcrypt for Passwords

Storing user passwords in plain text is a massive security failure. But even storing them using fast hashing algorithms like MD5 or SHA-256 is no longer considered safe. You need Bcrypt!

The Problem with SHA-256

Algorithms like SHA-256 were designed to be extremely fast. A modern GPU cluster can calculate billions of SHA-256 hashes per second. If a hacker steals your database, they can use brute force to guess your users' passwords in a matter of minutes.

The Bcrypt Solution

Bcrypt was designed from the ground up specifically for hashing passwords. It has two massive advantages:

1. It is intentionally slow: Bcrypt includes a "work factor" (or "rounds"). You can configure it so that hashing a single password takes 100ms or even 1 full second. This doesn't affect a user logging in, but it completely destroys a hacker's ability to brute-force a leaked database.
2. It includes an automatic salt: Every time you hash a password with Bcrypt, it automatically generates a random 128-bit salt and embeds it in the final hash string. This protects against rainbow table attacks without any extra work from the developer.

A Bcrypt hash looks something like this: $2a$12$R9h/cIPz0gi.URNNX3rubedAK0ZaX.U.3n.w2vK.Q.

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