OverTheWire Krypton Level 0 → 1 tutorial!!

Task

The challenge text gives you a Base64-encoded string:

S1JZUFRPTklTR1JFQVQ=

Your job is to decode this to get the password for krypton1.

A little bit of Theory

• Base64 is not encryption, just an encoding scheme to represent binary data as ASCII.
• Its alphabet is A–Z, a–z, 0–9, +, / with = padding.
• On Linux/macOS, you can decode Base64 directly from the shell.

Further reading:

• Base64 on Wikipedia

Solution

1. Decode with base64

   echo S1JZUFRPTklTR1JFQVQ= | base64 -d
   

   Output:

   KRYPTONISGREAT
   

   

2. Log into the next level

   ssh krypton1@krypton.labs.overthewire.org -p 2231
   # password: KRYPTONISGREAT
   

Password

KRYPTONISGREAT

Troubleshooting

• invalid option → On macOS, use base64 -D instead of -d.
• Output looks wrong → Ensure you copied the string without extra spaces/newlines.
• Permission denied → Paste the decoded string exactly as password.

Congrats 🎉 You solved Krypton Level 0 → 1 by decoding a Base64 string — welcome to krypton1!

Thanks for reading!

Until next time — Otsumachi!! 💖☄️✨