A strong password protects your account and, in order to maintain the security of your profile at the proper level, it is recommended to change it periodically. But this is not the only reason why you may need to reset your old password: your account may be hacked or you may simply forget your secret code.
- There is access to the profile and the old password
Today I will tell you how to change your old VK password to a new one from your computer and mobile phone, as well as how to change a forgotten password in situations where you have or have not logged into your profile on other devices, and also what to do if you don’t remember login, which is required to log in.
How to change the password in VK on a computer
First, let's look at the algorithm for replacing a password on a computer in various situations, including if the password is forgotten and if you lose access to the associated phone number and email.
There is access to the account and the old password
To change your VK password from your computer, go to your profile and in the upper right corner of the page, call up the drop-down menu by clicking on the avatar and the down arrow, then go to settings.
Next, in the “General” section, find the “Password” line and click “Change”. It also shows when it was last updated.
Fields will appear where you need to enter the old password, the one that is valid now, and enter the new one twice. If the current password is entered correctly, the system will notify you that the access code has been successfully changed; if there is an error, it will indicate it.
After you have changed your profile password, Contact will allow you to do this again no earlier than after 12 hours.
How to change a forgotten password on VK
To recover a forgotten password, go to the website and in the login data entry window, click “Forgot your password?”.
In the next window, enter the phone number or email address to which the page is linked, they are your login.
Then the VKontakte service will ask you to enter the last name specified in the profile.
Based on the completed information, VK will offer you a page to which you need to restore access; if the profile is correct, confirm; if not, go back and check whether all the data is entered correctly.
Next, you will be asked whether you have devices on which you are logged into your account. If you answer “yes, there is”, a system message will be sent from VKontakte with a code that will allow you to log into your profile on your computer. We will consider the situation if the answer is “no”.
In the next window, the social network will ask you to enter a phone number, a call will be received, the last four digits of the incoming unique number will need to be entered into a special window.
All you have to do is fill in the “new password” field and confirm it.
If you forgot your old password and don’t have access to your linked phone and email
The most problematic situation is a forgotten login and lack of access to your linked email and phone number. In this case, on the main page of the vk.com website, click the “Forgot your password?” link again.
But since there is no authorization data, click the “click here” link.
The service will ask for the address of your page; if you don’t remember it, your friends can see it by going to your profile, or you can use the search.
Once the account has been found, VKontakte will require you to fill in at least one field: old phone number, current phone number, email address or password, in order to verify that you are the owner.
In such situations, the pages are restored manually and you may have to provide technical support with your photo with your passport to confirm your rights.
The programmer showed how easy it is to hack a VK account. It all depends on your telecom operator
A Habr user has found a way to hack a VKontakte account, even if it is protected by two-factor authentication. All he needed for this was the victim’s phone number and its affiliation with one specific telecom operator. Due to loopholes in the company's security policy, hacking the account directly took the programmer only a few minutes.
For several years now, VKontakte has had a two-factor authentication function available, which was introduced by the developers to further secure user pages and public pages from intruders. Its essence is that after entering your username and password, you are asked to enter a code sent to your mobile phone number or generated in a special application on your smartphone.
It would seem that bypassing such a protection system should be very, very difficult, but Habr user programmer Daniil Andreev proved the opposite. He carried out a test hack of a VKontakte account, knowing only the phone number of its owner. Since every officially purchased SIM card is linked to a passport, mobile operators have the data of their clients and, according to Andreev, they often cease to be confidential.
Daniil tried to find the passport data of himself and his loved ones on the darknet by phone number and found that it was even too simple.
In my case, the database of a large communication store contained both my data and the data of my mother and even my grandmother. The cost of obtaining this information fits into the price tag of ~500-1000 rubles. It may look quite tedious and problematic, but in fact it takes no more than half an hour, and it is unlikely that anyone will look for you and find you afterwards.
After this, Andreev created a fake account on Vkontakte and wrote from it to the official community of several mobile operators, asking them to set up forwarding from the hacking victim’s number to his SIM card. All that one of the operators demanded from him was his previous phone number, the full name of its owner and his passport details. Exactly all the information that Andreev had at his disposal thanks to the darknet.
Of course, the victim will receive a forwarding notification to his phone number, but, as Daniil’s experience has shown, this can happen either after a few minutes or after a whole hour. But even in a few minutes, a hacker can already obtain the information he needs, and if he hacks into an account at four o’clock in the morning, then its owner will not immediately respond to the SMS that came to him.
As soon as Andreev activated the forwarding service, he proceeded directly to hacking the account and tried to change the password. To confirm this action, VKontakte sent an SMS with a code. It arrives on the victim’s phone, since forwarding only works for calls, but again, if you do everything quickly, the owner of the hacked account will not have time to take any action to protect his data.
Since Andreev never received the code, he asks VKontakte to send him another SMS, and after that the site offers to call him. This is exactly what the user needs. The robot calls the hacker's phone number and tells him the code, which the hacker uses to change the password. Even if the victim quickly changes the password, Daniil could either try to hack the profile again, or save all her data to his computer.
There is no problem running a page dump script that will save the entire history of correspondence, all the photos and everything your heart desires, in a couple of seconds.
The only thing that could prevent the implementation of the described plan is the operator’s refusal to set up forwarding via chat on VKontakte, and there were such operators. According to the rules of some, forwarding can only be set up through the phone itself; others wrote that forwarding can be set up either by calling the call center or in your personal account. And one operator even agreed to enable call forwarding only if the person came to the salon in person.
But where would we be without the unscrupulous?
One of the users suggested that the operator whose logo Daniil covered up was Beeline, and contacted their support service for comment. Judging by the user's screenshot, Beeline can indeed set up a redirect if the client simply provides passport data even through the VKontakte chat, and to prevent this from happening, you can come to the salon in person and set a universal password.
Habr users often find vulnerabilities in the security systems of various companies and services and often help people protect their personal data in this way. So, it is not at all necessary to log in through VKontakte when you want to watch a video on Pornhub. Medialeaks talked about several simple ways to remain anonymous when watching your favorite videos on the site.
Read on Medialeaks How to get rights in Moscow. We study online, we pass on the first try (but this is not certain)
And there really are reasons to fear for your personal data when using Pornhub. According to the company's official statements, it does not transfer data to third parties, but the veracity of these words can be doubted, given Pornhub's special relationship with VKontakte and Roskomnadzor.
How to change the password in VK from your phone
Next, we’ll look at how to change the VKontakte password on your phone if you have access to your profile and old password, as well as how to restore access to the page if the password is lost.
There is access to the profile and the old password
To change your password via your phone, go to the application and at the bottom of the screen go to your profile, then to account management.
Next, select the “Security and Login” section.
Click "Password".
To carry out the operation, you will need to enter the current password, in the next window, create, duplicate and save a new one.
If you forgot your old password
Recovering a password from a VK page on a phone differs from the computer version only in its interface. You will need to go into the application and in the password line, click on the question mark and enter your phone or email.
The next step is to check the Last Name of the page, and if there is a match, we move on. If you have other devices where you have already logged into your account, you can request confirmation for them; if not, then proceed to recovery.
Account confirmation is carried out by a phone call to the linked number, after which the VK application will allow you to change the password.
Now you can easily change your VKontakte password through the settings and restore access to your account if the secret code has been forgotten.
