I've discovered that login, sudo, gdm only take care of the first 8 characters of the passwd. The following characters don't count. See the following example (I've created a new user just to make the test)
$$ adduser test Adding user test... Adding new group test (1006). Adding new user test (1006) with group test. Enter new UNIX password: qwertyuiop <-- this, for example 10 letters Retype new UNIX password: qwertyuiop passwd: password updated successfully Changing the user information for test Enter the new value, or press ENTER for the default Full Name []: Room Number []: Work Phone []: Home Phone []: Other []: Is the information correct? [y/n] y $$ su test Password: qwertyui <--- only 8 letters (qwertyuivnksshfdd, for example would be also ok) $$ whoami test I don't see nothing about this in BTS, I'm puzzled.