Kaspersky Password Checker

The Russian software company Kaspersky has published a klingon version of their online password checker (1), in Klingon chaw' ngoq Hung tobwI'.

Klingon language

There are too many klingon lines in there to mention them here, but all the lines seem to be correct and good Klingon. The translation has been done by Andrew Miller, with some assistance of Marc Okrand (2). It is not certain although whether the entire project can be considered as canon.

History

In 2014, the computer security company Kaspersky was looking for someone to translate a password analysis tool into Klingon. It estimated how long a brute-force "attack" would take to break a given password. Each short range of time had a comment relating it to things in everyday experience. As the times got longer, the comments got less ordinary. One was this:

"Tardigrade — the hardiest animal on the planet can exist in vacuum that long! It could crack your password while being there with a generic computer, and it's your luck it doesn't want to."

That's how the borrowed word, with its Klingon pronunciation/spelling of tarDIghaD, ended up in the lexicon.

Actual situation

The screenshot above shows the password checker UI with correct Klingon text in the standard Okrandian orthography (although it's all capitalized). However the live site now (November 2019) displays text in mangled pIqaD, with obvious English text written in pIqaD (e.g. Sechure paSSworD chHechQ) and obvious Klingon words using an incorrect mapping of caracters (e.g. chHaw nghoq Dalo boghH yIghHItlHqo) - note the inverted q and Q and missing apostrophes.

The text that appears interactively as you type a password into the field is a mixture of English (your paSSworD wIll be brutengorcheD...) and Klingon, all in broken pIqaD. The Klingon text contains at least one untransliterated English proper noun that ends up being similarly mangled (there's a reference to a ngerrarI puH Duj chHu).

Now (Oct 2022) the page is completely gone.

Vocabulary

There is no specific new vocabulary in the app, but since Marc Okrand did cooperate with this translation, we have at least these two expressions, which are canon now:

slug, snail tera' nagh DIr charwI' mach (literally "terran small stone-skin slimy one") (3)

tardigrade tarDIghaD - This is a loanword: "Maltz never heard of such a thing. He said just to use the Federation Standard word with a Klingon pronunciation." (4)

See also

• Portal Software

References

1 : Message on Twitter, published 22 Jan 2015

2 : Message on Facebook by Andrew Miller, 22 Jan 2015

3 : confirmed during a talk with Andrew Miller on 23 Jan 2015

4 : qep'a' wish list, reprinted in qepHom'a' 2015 booklet, p.14

External links

• http://blog.kaspersky.de/password-check/klingon/ Online password checker