A researcher named Samy Kamkar discovered a flaw in Master-brand combination locks and was able to open the lock in eight tries or less. In cryptography, this is called a brute force attack trying every single possible combination until the one that works is discovered. The same type of attack is used against cryptographic algorithms and the same is done in encryption algorithms. A weak password can shatter the strongest encryption, as can poor implementation of the algorithm and coding errors. The encryption algorithm is clearly the strongest link in the chain.”]