Scribd
Upload
7 views

Excel VBA Password Via Hex Editor

The document discusses bypassing passwords on Excel VBA projects by modifying hex values in the file with a hex editor. It notes this approach no longer works on newer versions and provides an example of padding hex values to match the original file's length to get it to work on an older Windows version.

Uploaded by

Amit Goyal
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
7 views

Excel VBA Password Via Hex Editor

The document discusses bypassing passwords on Excel VBA projects by modifying hex values in the file with a hex editor. It notes this approach no longer works on newer versions and provides an example of padding hex values to match the original file's length to get it to work on an older Windows version.

Uploaded by

Amit Goyal
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 3

Excel VBA Password via Hex Editor - Stack Overflow about:reader?url=https%3A%2F%2Ffanyv88.com%3A443%2Fhttps%2Fstackoverflow.com%2Fquestions...

stackoverflow.com

Excel VBA Password via Hex Editor


BlueSkies 2020BlueSkies 2020 52311 gold badge55 silver badges77
bronze badges

~3 minutes

I have used the "Hex Editor to modify DPB to DPx" many times in
the past to bypass VBA project security on my old Excel VBA
projects (.xls), so I definitely know how to do it and know that I can
do it.

However I have just tried to do it yesterday and found that it no


longer seems to work. I tried using both Excel 2011 (Mac) and
Excel 2003 (Windows) and in both cases, I got the same
behaviour;

Opening the VBA editor gave a message saying that the project is
corrupted and that the project will be removed. The VBA editor
then opens and, sure enough, all VBA is stripped out from
modules and worksheets.

I have tried this method: Is there a way to crack the password on


an Excel VBA Project? (ie. creating a spreadsheet with a known
password and then copying across the relevant fields)

But find that the length of the "GC" key created on my 'dummy'
spreadsheet is shorter than the "GC" key on the spreadsheet that I
am wishing to access (the "target"). I had read elsewhere that in

1 of 3 13-Apr-2023, 8:45 PM
Excel VBA Password via Hex Editor - Stack Overflow about:reader?url=https%3A%2F%2Ffanyv88.com%3A443%2Fhttps%2Fstackoverflow.com%2Fquestions...

cases where the "target" keys were longer, you could pad the
"dummy" keys to the same length but there is nothing i can find to
say what to do in the reverse case.

So - my questions (s);

• Is anyone aware if a patch has been applied that makes the "hex
editor" approach invalid?

• Can anyone help with what to do when the dummy keys are longer
than the target keys?

• Can anyone else provide any updated onsite into this issue?

EDIT Having now solved this (to some degree) i thought i'd add a
summary here.

I HAVE NOT been able to get this to work on Mac Excel 2011.
Something about changing the file from filname.xlsm to
fielname.zip and back again results in a corrupted excel file which
Excel 2011 refuses to recognise.

I DID manage to get this to work on an old windows machine


(XP/Excel 2007) by modifying the .xlsm file name to .zip, editing
the DPB= AND GC= values in the vbaproject.bin file with a hex
editor then saving this in the .zip file before renaming the .zip back
to xlsm. I used the "test" example given by Ricko at the bottom
and it worked with ONE CAVEAT - i had to 'pad' out my GC value
to make it that same length as the original one in my file.

ORIGINAL: GC="0F0DA36FAF938494849484"
NEW: (TEST) GC="BAB816BBF4BCF4BCF4" (from Ricko
below)
NEW: (TEST) GC="BAB816BBF4BCF4BCF40000" (what i
used and what worked)

2 of 3 13-Apr-2023, 8:45 PM
Excel VBA Password via Hex Editor - Stack Overflow about:reader?url=https%3A%2F%2Ffanyv88.com%3A443%2Fhttps%2Fstackoverflow.com%2Fquestions...

3 of 3 13-Apr-2023, 8:45 PM

You might also like