im trying to use hashcat on a hash from hackthebox with rule and i get the output of Exhausted every time

Question

The hash is an SHA1 hash that i need to append 2020 to the end of each password:

The rule.txt file input is: "$2 $0 $2 $0"

The command:

hashcat -a 0 -m 100 hash.txt /opt/useful/SecLists/Passwords/Leaked-Databases/rockyou.txt -r rule.txt

The output:

Host memory required for this attack: 65 MB

Dictionary cache hit:

• Filename..: /opt/useful/SecLists/Passwords/Leaked-Databases/rockyou.txt
• Passwords.: 14344384
• Bytes.....: 139921497
• Keyspace..: 14344384

Approaching final keyspace - workload adjusted.

Session..........: hashcat

Status...........: Exhausted

Hash.Name........: SHA1

Hash.Target......: 46244749d1e8fb99c37ad4f14fccb601ed4ae283

Time.Started.....: Sun Jul 18 15:02:59 2021 (4 secs)

Time.Estimated...: Sun Jul 18 15:03:03 2021 (0 secs)

Guess.Base.......: File (/opt/useful/SecLists/Passwords/Leaked-Databases/rockyou.txt)

Guess.Mod........: Rules (rule.txt)

Guess.Queue......: 1/1 (100.00%)

Speed.#1.........: 4041.7 kH/s (0.37ms) @ Accel:1024 Loops:1 Thr:1 Vec:8

Recovered........: 0/1 (0.00%) Digests

Progress.........: 14344384/14344384 (100.00%)

Rejected.........: 0/14344384 (0.00%)

Restore.Point....: 14344384/14344384 (100.00%)

Restore.Sub.#1...: Salt:0 Amplifier:0-1 Iteration:0-1

Candidates.#1....: $HEX[206b6d383130383832303230] -> $HEX[042a0337c2a156616d6f73210332303230]

Started: Sun Jul 18 15:02:59 2021

Stopped: Sun Jul 18 15:03:04 2021

Why do hashcat get's Exhausted on the search?

Answer 1

Exhausted simply means hashcat has tried every possible password combination in the attack you have provided, and failed to crack 100% of all hashes given. In other words, hashcat has finished doing everything you told it to do – it has exhausted its search to crack the hashes.