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Like a similar post, I'm sure this has been posed too many times to count. But in my hurry to print the paper wallet and sign out of the computer, I forgot the passphrase to my key. I chose the option to BIP38 encrypt. I'm willing to pay a couple hundred dollars if someone can help me. I bought a hardware wallet, and went to sweep the paper wallet but forgot I put a passphrase on it. Pretty awesome. I've been manually brute forcing it all day. Has this ever happened to anybody and have you been successful in cracking the passphrase? 

Since you're willing to pay for the service, just use Dave's walletrecoveryservices.
I haven't personally used the service since my stuffs are well-organized but the testimonies and the user's trust ratings (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=trust;u=130960) are assuring.

Here's the Bitcointalk thread: Bitcoin Wallet Recovery Services - for forgotten wallet password (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=240779.0)
The website: www.walletrecoveryservices.com (http://www.walletrecoveryservices.com)

BIP38 ("Passphrase-protected private key") utilises "Scrypt"... which is notoriously "slow" when it comes to attempting to bruteforce it. It was chosen for this very reason :P

As you can see from the stats on this BIP38 bruteforce tool (https://github.com/agurodriguez/brute_force_bip38)... it took 337.219 seconds to check 500 passwords! at a speed of roughly 1 passphrase per 0.675 seconds :o :-\

This bruteforce tool (https://github.com/fartcoin-project/brute_force38) was running at around 0.6s/passphrase during the run in this video. (https://youtu.be/R35UZT6tGCk?t=248) :-\ As the video presenter points out "it is not a very fast bruteforcer"...

There is also this one: https://github.com/cculianu/brute38 (no idea on the speed)