Password Keeper?

[lydy]

I don't do New Year's Resolutions.  To be clear.  However, one thing I'd kind of like to do sometime real soon now is sort out my password situation.  It's a mess, with Google holding some, Apple Cloud holding some, Safari holding some, me remembering some....it's a mess, ok?

I have an Android phone, and a MacBook Air, and what I need is something that works cross platform.  Any suggestions?  And any idea how horrible it will be to transition from my current kludged state to something that is secure but actually makes sense?

Thanks in advance for any advice.
 

Comments

[sonia]

I use 1Password. I bought the Mac app years ago and used it happily on my laptop. I only reluctantly started paying an annual subscription a few months ago after an OS upgrade made that version stop working.

One of the benefits of a subscription is that I can access my same password database on my phone. I find the iPhone app clunky to use and tend to do most locked things on my Mac instead, but it is nice to know my passwords are available if I really need them, but not vulnerable if my phone gets hacked.

I took an afternoon to log in to all my accounts scattered across the internet, and either delete them or give them a generated password saved in 1Password. It was tedious but doable. I imagine getting 1Password set up from your current state would be similar. It does automagically pop up and offer to save passwords for you when you log in somewhere, which might speed things up for you.

Good luck!

[ckd]

I'm also a big fan of 1Password. We have a family plan so that my parents, my brother, and I can share important things (such as the combination to my suitcase, so that my dad can open it when I loan it to him :-) securely as well as having our own individual vaults.

In iOS 13, the system can use 1Password for autofill (though you need to enter the 1P master password each time, it's still easier than either remembering them all or using copy/paste).

[kalmn]

1password! With the family plan, if you need to share things with family (the combination for the lock on the shed, mom's amazon password since she always forgets it, etc.)

Dashlane?

[lsanderson]

I use Dashlane. It's OK, but $60 to synch. (I'm not sure it's worth that much.) So much depends on how the login page works with password managers. (Or at least with Dashlane.) Dashlane is good at tracking password breaches and warning you about reused passwords, etc. https://www.pcmag.com/roundup/300318/the-best-password-managers

I've used LastPass in the long ago, but I never paid for it and I don't think it synced.

FWIW, I think it's important to jack up security at accounts that can access your money accounts, banks, credit cards, etc. Not so important with accounts that don't. Password managers tend to treat all of your accounts as the same -- of dire importance.

Re: Dashlane?

[womzilla]

I'm not sure what you mean by "synch"--even in free mode, LastPass will work on all your desktop browsers. I haven't tried the Android version.

LastPass doesn't work perfectly--there are sites that will block it from auto-filling, which I suspect are a problem regardless of the manager you use--but it works pretty darn well.

Re: Dashlane?

[lsanderson]

'Synch' across devices. So I can use it on my desktop, laptops, and phone.

Re: Dashlane?

[womzilla]

Okay, yes, in free mode LastPass will synch across multiple desktops. The phone version is not free. (You can access your password vault in a phone browser for free, but it's *really* a pain.)

Re: Dashlane?

[lsanderson]

A big problem for me with complex password manager passwords is that you hafta use them everywhere. I can add memory to ma phone, but ma brain aint got no chip reader built-in.

[guppiecat]

Dashlane, 1Password, and LastPass are the classic winners for this.

However, if you have an Android phone (which I think you do), I can show you how to set up KeePassXC and Dropbox to do much the same thing for free. That's how I handle it.