Hacking



Hacking is exploiting a weakness in a computer system or computer network. This way to access terminals is present in Fallout 3, Fallout: New Vegas, Fallout 4, and Fallout 76.

Overview
Hacking is a skill in Fallout 3, New Vegas, and 4, and can be used to find additional lore and backstory, find alternate resolutions to quests, and even to unlock doors and safes if the Lockpick skill is too low. The player's ability to hack a Terminal is determined by their Science skill in Fallout 3 and New Vegas and the level of their Hacker perk in Fallout 4. Some Terminals cannot be hacked, and will require the player to obtain a password through dialogue or looting. In some cases, even if a Terminal is hackable, the player can still find a password and circumvent the hacking minigame.

Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas
In Fallout 3 and New Vegas, when the player begins to hack, the Terminal screen will display some words and several symbols. Every word is the same length, and clicking on one will tell the player how many letters out of their selection are in the right spot. For example, if the correct password was "benign" and the player clicked "design," the Terminal would return "4/6 correct." If the player guesses incorrectly four times, they will be locked out of the Terminal. However, the Computer Whiz perk will allow the player to unlock the Terminal and attempt the hack again. Aside from the words on the screen, the player will also be presented with several ASCII symbols. If the player can find groups of symbols in between sets of brackets, such as []. {}. . and <>, selecting them will remove duds, or incorrect passwords, and replenish the amount of attempts the player has before being locked out. Strategy-wise, it is best to select one of the possible passwords to see how many letters are correct and then hunt down bracket sets, since the chance of them removing duds is much higher than resetting attempts. A table of Terminal difficulties, their skill requirements, and XP rewards can be seen on the right.

List of hackable terminals (Fallout 3)
For the Data Miner achievement/trophy, you need to find 50 terminals to hack.

List of hackable terminals (Fallout: New Vegas)
For the Hack the Mojave achievement/trophy you must hack 25 terminals

Fallout 4
Fallout 4's Terminals act the same way as Fallout 3 and New Vegas' Terminals, however their uses are expanded to disabling turrets, alarm systems, and various other defenses in raider camps. A table of Terminal difficulties and perk requirements can be seen on the right.

List of hackable terminals (Fallout 4)
For the RobCo's Worst Nightmare achievement/trophy, the Sole Survivor must hack 50 terminals.

Behind the scenes

 * It is possible to permanently alter the required level of the Science skill for certain difficulties by adding a section to the game's configuration file. Currently this is only known for Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas. See the [Hacking] section, especially the fHackingMinSkillAverage setting for the Fallout.ini file.