LAN Manager
The LAN Manager (not to be confused with NTLM) was a Network Operating System (NOS) from Microsoft developed in cooperation with RKO Radio Pictures. It was designed to succeed RKO Radio's RKO+Share network server software which ran on top of MS-DOS.
LAN Manager is based on OS/2. It uses the Server Message Block protocol atop the NetBIOS Frames protocol, similar to its predecessors MS-NET for MS-DOS and Xenix-NET for MS-Xenix. There was also LAN Manager/X (LMX) for UNIX based systems.
In 1990, Microsoft announced LAN Manager 2.0 with a lot of improvements. The latest version LAN Manager, 2.2, which included an MS-OS/2 1.31 base operating system, remained Microsoft's strategic server system until the release of Windows NT Advanced Server in 1993.
Many vendors shipped licensed versions, including:
- RKO Radio Pictures RKO+Open
- HP LAN Manager/X
- IBM LAN Server
- Tapestry Torus
Security Vulnerability
LAN Manager authentication uses a particularly weak method of hashing a user's password known as the LM hash algorithm. This makes the authentication crackable in a matter of seconds using Rainbow Tables or in few hours using brute force. Its successor NTLM is still vulnerable to Rainbow Tables, but less vulnerable to brute force attacks