Q uses tripcodes to prove that his messages are truly from him and not from an imposter.

Tripcodes are a feature of the image boards that Q posts his messages on.

When Q posts a message, he types in his password. The message board software (4chan/8chan/8kun) converts his password to certain seemingly random characters. Those characters are Q’s “tripcode”.

Only someone who knows the password can post using that tripcode.

For example:

Q posts a message using the password “M@tlock!”. That password gets converted to the tripcode “!UW.yye1fxo”.

Only someone who posts with the password “M@tlock!” will be able to post under the tripcode “!UW.yye1fxo”.

That is how Q proves that messages are from him.

Only he knows the password (supposedly…), M@tlock!, so only he posts messages with the tripcode !UW.yye1fxo

But tripcodes are insecure!

They have been cracked many times. These are some of Q’s tripcodes that have been cracked by ordinary citizens on consumer hardware.

Tripcode: ITPb.qbhqo -> Password: Matlock Tripcode: UW.yye1fxo -> Password: M@tlock! Tripcode: xowAT4Z3VQ -> Password: Freed@m- Tripcode: 2jsTvXXmXs -> Password: F!ghtF!g Tripcode: 4pRcUA0lBE -> Password: NowC@mes Tripcode: CbboFOtcZs -> Password: StoRMkiL Tripcode: A6yxsPKia. -> Password: WeAReQ@Q

These weren’t cracked by the boundless resources of the deep state. These were cracked with off-the-shell software and hardware that any normal citizen could operate.

There are articles as old as 1997 that expose the insecurties of the DES/crypt(3) algorithm used by the message boards. http://personal.stevens.edu/~khockenb/crypt3.html

Note: “Longer passwords can be ignored, since crypt(3) will discard all but the first 8 characters of a password”

So even if Q used a more secure/longer password, only the first 8 characters get checked.

Did he know this? If not, he must not care very much about security. If he did know it, then why were his confirmed leaked passwords longer than 8 characters?

Like this one: “NowC@mesTHEP@in—23”

He’s either ignorant about security or he’s purposefully misleading, or both.