It is truly upsetting to see how few people use password managers. I have witnessed people who always use the same password (and even tell me what it is), people who try to login to accounts but constantly can’t remember which credentials they used, people who store all of their passwords on a text file on their desktop, people who use a password manager but store the master password on Discord, entire tech sectors in companies locked to LastPass, and so much more. One person even told me they were upset that websites wouldn’t tell you password requirements after you create your account, and so they screenshot the requirements every time so they could remember which characters to add to their reused password.
Use a password manager. Whatever solution you think you can come up with is most likely not secure. Computers store a lot of temporary files in places you might not even know how to check, so don’t just stick it in a text file. Use a properly made password manager, such as Bitwarden or KeePassXC. They’re not going to steal your passwords. Store your master password in a safe place or use a passphrase that you can remember. Even using your browser’s password storage is better than nothing. Don’t reuse passwords, use long randomly generated ones.
It’s free, it’s convenient, it takes a few minutes to set up, and its a massive boost in security. No needing to remember passwords. No needing to come up with new passwords. No manually typing passwords. I know I’m preaching to the choir, but if even one of you decides to use a password manager after this then it’s an easy win.
Please, don’t wait. If you aren’t using a password manager right now, take a few minutes. You’ll thank yourself later.
people who use a password manager but store the master password on Discord
???
Yeah, true story. Really weird.
I really want to know what the logic behind their thinking was…or maybe they were just lazy? I don’t know, it’s so weird that they’d get to the point of using a password manager but then still make such a basic error.
Marginally better than using discord itself as your password manager (also a true story!)
How does this work? Do they ask other people to remember their passwords?
Some people keep journal servers where it’s just them in a server alone, could be that
yes, it’s that.
How do I convince my girlfriend to stop using her safari password manager and migrate it to bitwarden? Is the password manager in Safari so unsafe that it’s worth the additional effort she might ask.
It’s not that bad, but tell her that she can set Bitwarden as the default option for auto-fill in the settings and everything will get automatically filled in, just like with the normal Safari password manager
Apple is releasing a more comprehensive password manager in the next few months, if she’s heavily in the apple ecosystem the switch could be pretty convenient
Obviously bitwarden or keepass would be great but this would be a bump up from being stored in a browser
Thanks for the update! I will keep an eye out
My understanding is that your GF will be using Apple’s KeyChain, which is pretty good except that it’s hard to look inside and manually edit. It’s not just in Safari.
The upcoming Password app is just a nice user interface to KeyChain. So no change to the functionality as such, but I think it’ll make a big difference to how it’s used.
it’s hard to look inside and manually edit
It’s actually pretty easy when you’re on a Mac. They bundle an app called Keychain Access, which lets you look at and edit everything.
Yes, that’s true. Keychain Access helps a lot.
My password manager is
mkdir ~/Account/some.domain cd $_ genpasswd | openssl some-cipher -k 'really strong encryption password' >pass.enc echo username >login#decrypt cd ~/Account/some.domain openssl some-cipher -d <pass.enc | xclip #paste in field xclip login #paste in fieldCouldn’t be easier, couldn’t be safer.
Why?
Why would I use a password manager when this is much simpler and less error-prone?
Nothing about this is simpler than just using a proper password manager.
One must imagine skill issue.
I suggest looking at how many dynlibs your password manager links against and tell me it’s “simpler” again.
Replying to this pretentious comment for the sake of others reading this:
Run
history | grep genpasswdfor why this is not a good password storage solution. One must image skill issue.If you think the CLI is the cool kid way to go, use https://www.passwordstore.org/, but tbh I don’t recommend that either.
Replying to this pretentious comment for the sake of others reading this:
Replying to this pretentious comment for the sake of others reading this:
Run history | grep genpasswd for why this is not a good password storage solution. One must image skill issue.
I have history disabled in my shell, and unless your shell logs to a file, the password stays in memory.
1337
In my experience preaching this same thing to many users at work and just personal friends, they won’t change their ways. Because “omg not another password to remember” and “that’s too much work to login just to get a password”.
I’ve just stopped trying to educate people at this point. That’s on them when their info gets leaked or accounts drained.
I am fighting this with people at work.
No, it is not “one more password to remember”
You have 2 passwords: your laptop and your Bitwarden. Forget everything else. Don’t care. Use a passphrase if you have troubles with passwords.
I even generated a sample password from bitwarden and drew them a picture of how to remember it lol
Still about 10% of people forgot their password in the first 2 months.
People are already annoyed at base that they need any 2FA at all and don’t want to deal with more info. They just tune out.
Tell them some password managers have TOTP support. I think I paid Bitwarden $10 for life or per year for TOTP so I don’t need to use my phone.
That kinda defeats the purpose of 2fa though, if you use bitwarden for both
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Instead of opening Google authenticator or Authy or whatever your preferred 2FA is, you can take photos of the QR codes in Bitwarden mobile to store the TOTP codes in it, and then Bitwarden puts them on your clipboard to paste into websites
.
It works as long as you can get at the authentication key that generates the one time codes. Usually you scan a QR code, but sometimes you have to paste it in as a string.
How you get that private authentication key can vary by service. For example, you can install steam mobile on an android emulator and use an open source program to extract the private authentication key.
Yup, they couldnt care less about any 2FA. But then they get the surprised Pikachu face when they get breached after being phished lol.
Say, what are the chances either
- someone comes to depend on the password manager to get into their accounts, gets locked out of the password manager, and loses access to all their accounts (e.g. using the password manager to create and store passwords they might never have even seen);
or
- their password manager (or account) gets hacked, somehow, and all their accounts get taken at once
These are real issues however they are pretty easy to mitigate, and I would say that the upsides of a password manager far outweigh the downsides.
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Make sure that you are regularly typing your master password for the first bit. After that you’ll never forget it. You can also help them out by saving a copy of their master password for them at least until they are sure they have memorized it. There are also password managers where you can recovery your account as long as you have the keys cached on at least one device.
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This is far, far outweighed by the risk of password reuse. This is because when a single one of the sites you use gets hacked then people will take that credential list and try it on every other site. So with a password manager there is just one target, without it is one of hundreds of sites where you reused your password. Many password managers also have end-to-end encryption so without your password the sync service can’t be hacked (as it doesn’t have access to your passwords).
Well, what if they somehow manage to get into my password manager account? I mean, it has a login, like any other account. The way to prevent it would be to have a strong enough password. Regardless, if they somehow got my main password, they’d have free access to all my credentials everywhere, and would be able to log into them as easily as I can. I mean, it is easier to secure one account well vs. however many others that the password manager can take care of. But still, a centralised hub with easy access to all my accounts feels like a one-stop shop for taking over my online life
I mean, to myself, I can deal with the consequences of my choices (as much as they can suck sometimes). But recommending stuff to other people I find complicated. I mean, I’ve gotten locked out of accounts due to 2fa (some being old and lost to time, others due to an unlucky series of events and a last minute half-assed backup) and even had to troubleshoot and/or reinstall (Linux) operating systems on my laptop (one instance of which relates to the aforementioned 2fa incident). To recommend something to someone and risk something like that, and be responsible for it… I mean, I once had to help troubleshoot a non-booting Linux machine via messages and photos during lunch out, and I myself am not an expert, so I had to online research from my phone and relay the information
These are all good points. This is why it is important to match your recommendations to the person. For example if I know they have Chrome and a Google account I might just recommend using that. Yes, it isn’t end-to-end encrypted and Google isn’t great for privacy but at least they are already managing logins over all of their devices.
In many cases perfect is the enemy of better. I would rather them use any password manager and unique passwords (even “a text file on their desktop”) than them sticking to one password anywhere because other solutions are too complicated.
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As Kramer said. Levels. If tou layer your security 2 becomes a non issue. What you have, what you know, and who you are. Which plays into 1. The 3-2-1 of backup. 3 copies of the data. 2 different media. At least 1 off site. Suprising as it might be, writing a great backup is to write your password down. I have a piece of paper with my password in a lock box in my apartment, in a safety deposit box at my bank, and at my parent’s house
- Ultimitaly its up to the user to remember the master password. I’m not familiar with how bitwarden works, but do use keepssXC. I hear bitwarden is better for less techical people due to having built in account/sync options. (You can also self-host BW if you want)
Keepass is file based, it is up to you to backup the file, for most users putting it an auto-synced cloud drive folder is their best bet. It’s automatic, multi-platform and offsite. Many technical users use sync thing (or equivalent) to manage the file across multiple backup locations.
KeePassXC is essentially a GUI for KeePass datbase, like word and openoffice can both open a .doc file, multiple programs can open a keepass file. If KeePassXC dies, theres others options for opening the file.
That being said, IOS options suck, theres one called Strongbox that is, in my opinion, the best. Its not FOSS like the others. Free version works 100% no problems, but they ask a high $20/yr sub or $90 lifetime for a handful of nonessential features (I’d love an decent alternative if anyone has one).
For Android I like KeepassDX and Keepass2Android.
- Getting hacked is a legitimate concern. However the greatest risk is still duplicate passwords. The time it will take crack an individual database is going to be less well spent than dumping a million username/password sets into a thousand sites and hoping for a match.
Realistically, if you’re the specific target of a hacker going specificaly after your database files you’re best off freezing your credit and bank accounts.
If your database gets hacked, there are a few ways you can midigate the damge, its up to an individual to balance convince and security.
First is 2fa. Keepass works great for TOTP 2fa, with browser integrations, its a breeze signing into sites. If you want more security, you would have a seperate database file with a different master password for 2fa. Now a hacker needs to crack 2 databases.
Another way to midigate the risk is to seperate whatever emails you use from the main bunch, this way if the main databse gets compromised, you won’t lose the emails that let you reset everything else. If the email gets cracked, they won’t have a convient list of accounts to go mess with. Also make sure the emails have all the security and recovery options available setup.
3, bonus round Finally for fincial security, don’t have your credit card saved on every site. I don’t let most of them store it all and use privacy.com for pretty much every thing these days. Set transaction limits on regularly used sites, and set up a “1-time use” card for anythibg irregular.
Even if some brakes into, for example my amazon account, they are going to find a $100 purchase won’t work. I’ll get an email and can just cancel the privacy card for amazon (I’d probably kill them all to be safe) and then work on resecuring everything.
To top it off Privacy.com it self has a dedicated credit card attached with a strict limit to midigate damge.
For privacy.com:
- great for anyone in the USA
- don’t worry about difficult subscription cancellations again, just turn that one’s dedicated card off
- I have personally blown past the daily spend limit of 250$ without issue, idk if that limit is real. The 1000$/mo may be though I’ve never hit that.
- I’ve used privacy.com for everything from Amazon to car insurance to gym memberships.
On credit freezes:
- a freeze means that your consumer report will not be shared, which means applications for credit in your name will be denied
- all USA consumer reporting agencies (data brokers) are legally required to freeze sharing of your reports for free upon your request
- you can temporarily unfreeze when you get a new credit card, apply for rental property, etc.
- don’t let them upsell it or try to direct you to another page with similar language, it is free
- credit monitoring products need to request your report to see if any new accounts have opened. Don’t monitor it, prevent it by freezing the reports
- freezes are required for any data broker, not just credit. This includes LexisNexis (job history), and presumably the ones that do rental and vehicle ownership history though i don’t know their names.
I was talking about the individual card limits that can be set, those definatly work.
Edit, looking my account, I too have 250daily and 1000 monthy limit. The next paragraph might be be outdated?
I know the total daily limit is “adaptive” or something set based on your spending habits. I’d prefer setting the limit myself, but it is what it is.It at least used to be adaptive because at one point it went to 500$ for me, then changed back down a couple months later.
just. write it down? in a notebook? keepassxc is rly good if you dont want to do that though
But what if you lose the notebook? Or just don’t have it on you, when you need it? God help ya if someone malicious gets it. Keep it digital, always available, backed up, and secure.
This is not a real solution. You’re supposed to have a unique password for everything. Managing that notebook would be an hassle, not to mention backing it up. It would easily have dozens of records, if not hundreds.
oh shit fair enough!! i use temp-mail.org for most things so i frogot about accounts for every tiny service lmao
If you’re on Linux and you don’t want to use KeepassXC, you can check out Secrets on Flathub, it has imo a better UI/UX
If you’re on Linux and you like minimalism, pass is also a great option
Interesting, thanks for the recommendation.
Using Proton Pass was a game changer to me , I don’t have to ignore the necessity to put a strong and complicated password for security reasons anymore, Proton generate it to me and stores everything ( so I don’t need to remember which password I set for which account ) But the bad aspects of cloud services worry me a little about this: the possibility of a security breach of the service, or the possibility of not being able to access it for any reason is a real disaster if it happens… so I’m thinking of exporting my passwords to another safe place for such cases.
even if their servers were compromised it’s all encrypted. it only decrypts on your end
But the bad aspects of cloud services worry me a little about this
KeePassXC is entirely local.
I know , but won’t that affect my storage if I added +1000 password ?
Passwords don’t take up much space.
unless your storage is a floppy disk, won’t be a problem
I actually considered sticking it on a floppy disk I have. It really is a wonder how Linux is able to recognize floppy disks immediately…
It really is a wonder how Linux is able to recognize floppy disks immediately…
As is Windows.
It shouldn’t take up too much space. My personal password file is under 2 KB, so for you it may be 1 MB at most.
Which creates issue with having to synchronize it between devices. There is always something to worry about :)
Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good.
Exactly, so use Proton :P
that’s nice soundbite, i am just saying you have to be realistic. if you are aiming at people who up until now had their passwords on post-it on the monitor, switching to tool where you need to come up with some synchronization system on your own might not be what convinces them.
so I’m thinking of exporting my passwords to another safe place for such cases.
I’m also using ProtonPass, and I agree it’s a game changer. I love the interface, the Android app is amazing and well integrated.
To not be locked in into ProtonPass in case of real disaster, once a month I export the ProtonPass data and import to KeepassXC in my local machine. It’s pretty easy, you just have to export to CSV, and import into KeepassXC, the interface will help you to map the CSV fields accordingly, and you will have a local accessible backup in case of disaster. Don’t forget to remove the CSV from your computer after importing to KeepassXC.
You can export all your passwords to an encrypted and password protected file. I ocasionally back it up to a USB device so that I always have an offline copy available.
Still, one of these days I was logged out of my proton pass on Android and couldn’t connect to the internet. I was locked down.
On the plus side, the more people who don’t use password managers the more chance us password manager users will remain not worth the effort.
It’s kinda like security through obscurity mixed with only having to be faster than the slowest person to outrun a lion.
I disagree. Password managers are still target of threat actors, a juicy one at that, but it’s not too often you hear of breaches of good password managers. Chances are the people behind the good password managers are better at security than 99% of users (including more technical ones). Even after a breach exporting all the passwords and moving them to another service, and changing all your passwords again with more secure ones is trivially easy.
If everyone used them sure there’d be more pressure on said password managers but hackers will find it a lot more difficult to hack anything in general and it will still not be worthwhile to hack average users who use a password manager.
I have a password manager with a family plan so my wife can use it. Does she? Absolutely not. And that’s why we don’t share bank accounts.
Same and she has the balls to ask me for passwords!
Same here. Kinda feels good to know I am not alone with this, though.
Absolutely this. Been using KeePassDX for years and its made my life so much easier. I am waiting for it to support passkeys so i can start using them where possible.
I’m not in IT but I followed the Michael Bazzell podcast until he disappeared. Guy was a bit paranoid but there was great info there. My understanding was browser saving passwords isn’t secure, that those passwords are open to scraping from bad players. Ofc I can’t reference this because the entire body of over 300 podcasts disappeared with him.
Agree on Bitwarden and such.
I’ve been using Firefoxs integrated password manager for lots of unimportant logins, KeePass for everything else.
I have been using password gestoires for a long time. First LastPass, until I switched to GNU/linux and discovered Keepass and then KeepassXC… For me they are indispensable. That’s the one I used until about 1 year ago when I started having problems with the Firefox addon. It did not recognize the pages. I tried ProtonPass and I like it, but I don’t like having them online, no matter how secure the site is. I’ve tried going back to KeepassXC, locally, but the file I export from ProtonPass won’t load in KeepassXC. I feel stuck.
Translated with DeepL.com (free version)
Did you export ProtonPass to CSV?
Yes, I export to CSV but when I import in KeepassXC, only one column appears.
I’ve tried going back to KeepassXC, locally, but the file I export from ProtonPass won’t load in KeepassXC. I feel stuck.
Open a bug report in KeepassXC’s repository, maybe it’s a big in their code. Or they’ll tell you that the bug is in proton pass, and you can report it there too so that they know about it and can fix it. Maybe the KeepassXC team can give you a workaround too
Open a bug report in KeepassXC’s repository, maybe it’s a big in their code. Or they’ll tell you that the bug is in proton pass, and you can report it there too so that they know about it and can fix it. Maybe the KeepassXC team can give you a workaround too
My English is very poor for technical explications… I search the issue in KeepassXC Github but I don’t found similar solution.
Proton Pass is a pretty new service, maybe there haven’t been much users yet who have moved to KeepassXC from it. I would say give it a try, it’s not that bad.
Something else you could try is:
a) check the Bitwarden repo if anyone had a similar problem as you. If so, it’s more likely that it’s a Proton Pass problem, and maybe they have some tips.
b) import your Proton Pass export to another password manager (Bitwarden, original Keepasd), export it from there, and try to import this in KeepassXC. Though this might have a higher chance of losing some information, in the sense of metadata. If you go this way, don’t forget to make a fresh export of your Proton Pass account, in case you have changed something there in the meantime
My dad somehow believes that that password managers are very insecure ( he got that from some sort of ‘reputable source’, so me telling him bitwarden is secure doesn’t help) and he just writes down all of his completely randomly generated passwords in a notebook, which always seems really inefficient to me, especially when he writes a character down incorrectly.
My wife does this with index cards. I have to try to figure out what she wrote down (1? l?) and she crosses out an old one and writes the new one in a random spot so I have to study the card to find the live pw.
Is your dad Ron Swanson? /j
I mean he’s not wrong about paper being more secure than password manager (provided you have good physical security and trust the people you live with)
Yes, but this is like replacing the front door of your house with a bank vault door. Yes, it’s more secure, but there is a point of “reasonably secure enough” for most people and at some point, you are just inconveniencing yourself for no tangible gain.
Only until he gets a keylogger on his computer
Well yeah I guess that’s true
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He’s doing something right.
You can’t hack a paper note over the internet.
