Nowadays we use different websites and Apps in our daily life. Social Networking sites like Facebook, Instagram, Linkedin, Twitter, knowledge-sharing websites like Quora, Goodreads, Github, or digital wallets like Paytm, Google Pay, and taxi booking services lien Uber, Ola, etc. So the count is endless. On average, we use around 100 to 120 websites/apps for our daily needs. So do you remember all the passwords?
Remembering passwords is next to impossible? Some people scribble in notebooks which is not a practical solution Or even some store them in their local system. This may be a safe solution as you only have access to your system. But what if you are mobile and need to check your websites while in taxi, airport, or in office or in the outstation?
The solution is a password manager. Many of the browsers like Google, Firefox, or Microsoft Edge provide Password Managers. How does the Password manager Work? Let us see in detail.
A password manager is a software application that store and manages the passwords that a user has for various websites or Apps. Password managers store the passwords in a totally encrypted format and provide secure access to all the password information with the help of a master password.
Let us see how Google Password manager work. Click Here
The important point to remember is that you should have a strong password of length more than 8 characters(a combination of alphabets, number, and special characters like @,%#, etc) for your Gmail account. The password strength should be strong.( Either remember this or store in a safe place). That is all. All the websites you have logged in using chrome will be stored in Google Password Manager and you need not remember them or write in a register.
Whenever you want to open the password manager, you need to login with Gmail and once opened it will show all the websites you have opened with chrome.
Settings for Password Manager
Click on gear symbol and the following settings will appear
You can offer to save passwords and allow Auto sign-in. You can export your passwords in text format by clicking on Export Button. It will also show the list of sites and apps you’ve chosen not to save passwords.
For Password saved websites, you can click on the website link to view, edit, or copy the password. For websites where passwords are saved, you can click and open the site, and login in form is auto-filled( if you have enabled the auto sign-in options in settings as shown above. No need to type a password in the login form.
Password Checkup
One of the fine feature of password manager is Password Checkup.
It will show you a report about the passwords you used for various websites. See the image below
Out of these Compromised passwords is more alarming and you need to change the passwords for those websites. Similarly, you can take necessary action for reused passwords and accounts having weak passwords.
Friends it is time for all of us to start using Password Manager. In my next post, I will discuss third party Password Managers. Please share your experiences about passwords protection and keeping track of them
Good article Nanna, very useful
Nice article. I use LastPass, which is a paid product, but lets you do three things, which I think are essential for a modern day password manager.
– Offer to generate strong passwords, automatically, when you are going through the sign-up process on a new site.
– Offer to auto-complete saved passwords and user names on existing sites.
– Offers a chrome extension, mobile app and website access so your mobile, and web needs are covered by a single product.
– Secure password storage on the cloud. (passwords are encrypted, and require your master password for decryption)
Two downsides with LastPass:
– If access to LastPass is compromised, then someone can potentially hack into all your accounts. But I guess, that’s the case with most password managers.
– If you are the same application on your desktop (Eg. Evernote), then LastPass can’t really offer password suggest but it’s a web/mobile only product. It’d be nice if someone could create a product that unifies web, desktop and mobile experience all into one product.
You can save your passwords wherever it is accessable to you when you want. It could be in a tiny book that you can keep in your purse or encripted in an App format or store a file in your cell itself which will be more safe with an file opening password so that only you know about it. This is more secure and whenever you want can look for it.
Great article!
For firefox users: they made a product out of their password manager now called firefox lockwise.
Nice article. Password management across accounts, devices is a bit of a challenge
One feature that some applications support (that I like) is to offer a 2-factor authentication with finger print scan being one of them.
This feature is especially useful on mobile devices, tablets.
It saves time and solves the problem of remembering passwords, PINs for different applications. Since we spend increasing amounts of our screen time on mobile devices,
if there are any tools out there that offer such an option for all applications on mobile phone and tablets, that would be a good a long way in addressing the pain points around password management!
Useful article …. should read in detail and decide the best option for me ! Thanks Murali !
Great article! It would be great if don’t have to create passwords at all, similar to mobile apps these days where we can enable facial recognition for access.
As more and more devices now come with integrated cameras. We are still far away in getting there.
Agree password managers save the day in keeping us secure in a digital locker.
Look forward to the rest of the series on this topic.