Review: KeePass makes strong passwords and keeps them safe - reidwitua1960

At a Glint

Expert's Rating

Pros

Free and open-source
Simple to use

Cons

Requires active consumption (non automatic)

Our Verdict

KeePass is absolutely essential for safekeeping your passwords secure and unique.

If you adopt scarce one security instrument this year, make it KeePass. This free and ASCII text file password manager is available for Windows, with unofficial ports for iOS, Android, Linux, and Mac OS X. A secure, protracted, completely random password goes a long way of life towards improving your security system–and having a separate parole for from each one and every website and service you use is the single most important affair you can do to keep secure.

For too many of us, the alternative to a countersign handler is using the same password everywhere. This means that if the user database of whatever same website you sign up for is compromised, hackers buns (and often DO) scarcely try your username and word on many other websites and gain access. Thus, seriously: Use a unique, trying password for each and every website you sign improving for, no matter how little you plan to visit it. KeePass lets you keep all of these username/watchword pairs in a securely encrypted database, snug behind a azygous master password, which is the entirely password you're ever going to have to remember. And unlike commercial competition LastPass, KeePass doesn't automatically put across your password database in the cloud (although you can put it into Dropbox yourself).

KeePass lets you quick-search for passwords and organise them into a complex tree diagram of folders.

KeePass features its possess random parole author, so you don't have to come aweigh with random passwords on your own. It includes a quick-search box where you can type just a sherd of a website's appoint to quickly find it on your list. The list itself is stacked to hold back thousands of records, and you can subdivide information technology into folders and subfolders to keep things organised. KeePass isn't limited to just usernames and passwords, either: Each entry has several separate fields, including a free-form Notes champaign which you can use for firmly storing any separate of text.

One way the baddies skirt password protection is with a keylogger: an application (or a physical hardware dongle connected to your computer) that sits in the background, quietly logging all single keystroke you type, to later transmit this information to an attacker. With a keylogger installed on your arrangement, an attacker could potentially learn every bingle word you eccentric throughout the sidereal day, including all of your usernames and passwords. This is another thing KeePass protects against: Thanks to its AutoType feature, you ne'er have to manually type individual website passwords. KeePass pastes them into the web browser windowpane using a combination of virtual keystrokes and clipboard obfuscation, making it all the more difficult for a keylogger to see out what the watchword is. AutoType is sometimes finicky, but when IT workings, information technology's very useable. KeePass also lets you enter your master database parole in a efficient protected away UAC, which protects it from some software keylogger that isn't running with Administrator rights connected your machine.

Get KeePass, and pop out using it correct now. You'll give thanks yourself next time a starring internet site breach vents thousands of usernames and passwords into internet.

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Endlessly tweaking his workflow for comfort and efficiency, Erez is a freelance writer on a mission to discover the simplest, coolest, and most good software and websites to cause tomorrow happen now.