[leapius]

Yes a cryptographic hash (like MD5 or SHA etc) stores a non-reversible string. Encryption means that it reversible but lets be honest here, when writing an article most laymen understand the general idea of encryption as opposed to hashing.

I'd really like to see how this hack works for general knowledge and if it's purely via the script itself and not a server attack.

[alexkus]

Don't forget that most symmetric encryption algorithms can be used as a hash. Just encrypt a known plaintext (usually all NUL bytes) using the password as the key.

[ReidZB]

If you do that and only that, you open yourself up to related-key attacks. A better approach would be to use a well-known scheme like the Merkle–Damgård construction.