How password managers work

Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2019/05/02/how-password-managers-work.html

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Unless I’m missing something, it seeems to me the best solution would be to use a locally-stored password manager instead of the cloud-based ones he was talking about. Then you don’t have to worry about trusting the company whose servers you store your passwords on. But it was interesting to hear his discussion of why he trusts these companies and how they work.

If you use only one device, a single local database would work. My password manager encrypts the password db locally and stores it in the cloud so that I can access my passwords on all of my devices.

My password manager encrypts the password db locally and stores it in the cloud so that I can access my passwords on all of my devices.

I agree that this is the way to go; what do you use? I use KeePassX on my Mac, Dropbox it to the cloud, and access it via MiniKeePass on my iPad and phone. But it doesn’t have integration with the browsers on the Mac, and I don’t make changes on my iOS devs since I can’t sync them with changes made on the Mac.

I use Lastpass. It’s not perfect on Android. Sometimes the password fill-in dialog pops up when I don’t need it, on normal text fields like the one I’m typing in now. And other times, it won’t pop up when I’m in a login field, and I have to trigger it manually. It’s a minor nuisance. But if I add or change a password on my desktop, it’s reflected immediately on all of my other devices. I couldn’t tell you how well it integrates on Mac and iOS, but the hosts of Security Now use it on both platforms, and they still recommend it after many years.

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