Bob is doing a password assessment for one of his clients. Bob suspects that security policies are not in place. He also suspects that weak passwords are probably the norm throughout the company he is

Hardware keyloggers physically intercept keystrokes between the keyboard and computer. Software keyloggers capture keystrokes at the OS or application layer. Network sniffing captures credentials transmitted in cleartext protocols such as Telnet, FTP, or basic HTTP - together these three methods cover the full attack surface for password retrieval across both local and network vectors.

Hardware and software keyloggers are valid but this answer omits network sniffing, which is a significant and commonly exploited method for capturing credentials in transit.

Hardware keyloggers require physical access and are therefore not always the most practical method; software keyloggers and sniffing are often more scalable and easier to deploy remotely.

Software-only methods miss hardware keyloggers and network sniffing, both of which are widely documented and effective password-retrieval techniques in real-world assessments.