Hello,

The following is only for EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES, I am not Responsible If anyone misuses this technique to cause problems.

I have observed some mechanism used by hotmail which I am sure they use for security but It can create a problem as well. To prevent cracking of the passwords, hotmail has a system of ignoring the ID for a while (can be a minute, or an hour, or several hours) after several wrong passwords attempts are made. Let me elaborate;

Suppose "A" has a hotmail.com address named A@hotmail.com.

User "B" is a bad-guy, he creates a brute-force software or downloads one from the internet that will try to access A@Hotmail.com again and again with random/wrong passwords. After hotmail's software detects this behaviour, they will block "A@Hotmail.com" on temp basis. Then Even If "A" (Real owner of the email A@Hotmail.com) comes and punches in the correct password, hotmail will not accept it and give a error of wrong password. If This method is used again and again on some specific ID, It can lead on getting the hotmail account locked for a longer time (Even days).

King Regards
- ThaHawk