Explain like I’m 5 years old: Kerberos – what is Kerberos, and why should I care? While this topic probably can not be explained to a 5 year-old and be understood, this is my attempt at defragmenting documentation with some visual aids and digestible language. In a nutshell Basically, Kerberos comes down to just this: a protocol for authentication uses tickets to authenticate avoids storing passwo