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Disable all passwords temporarily
#57419 12/23/20 10:50 PM
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I'm having video problems with my MacBook Pro, and will need to take it in for service. The last time I had my computer in for service, the technician said he needed my login password. I didn't have much option except to give it to him. However, with recent news of renegade employees stealing user account info, there's no way that I'll let anyone have a password that will essentially allow access to all of my online bank accounts and credit card accounts via Keychain Access and whatever other facility that web browsers use to remember passwords. I don't see any way of disabling automatic logins though.

Is there a way to temporarily disable Keychain Access and the remembered passwords on Firefox & Safari?

I'm running OSX Sierra on a 2015 MacBook Pro.

Last edited by Bob_00001; 12/23/20 10:51 PM.

MacBook Pro 15" (2015)
Sierra 10.12.6
Re: Disable all passwords temporarily
Bob_00001 #57420 12/23/20 11:04 PM
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I'm not certain in which version of the OS it disappeared, but Keychain Access used to offer an option to have your keychain password differ from your login password. (I was quite unhappy when it disappeared!)

Take a look in your KA menu bar, probably under either "File" or "Edit," and see if it's available to you.

I believe that Safari can't access its saved passwords with KA "locked," but I've got no idea about other browsers.


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Disable all passwords temporarily
artie505 #57425 12/24/20 04:43 AM
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Thanks. Yes, there is an item in the Edit menu that I'd missed: "Change Password for Keychain Login"

Safari, seems to be mostly secure now, although it still remembers my bank card number, which is somewhat disturbing, but it doesn't remember the password.
With Firefox, I see that I can go into its preferences and view/edit/delete all of the passwords that it has saved. Not as useful as being able to temporarily lock them, but I can easily export them to a text file on a removable drive, for later restoration, and then delete them.

For future, I'm going to have to investigate having all of the keychain stuff on a thumb drive.


MacBook Pro 15" (2015)
Sierra 10.12.6
Re: Disable all passwords temporarily
Bob_00001 #57427 12/24/20 04:50 AM
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Originally Posted by Bob_00001
With Firefox, I see that I can go into its preferences and view/edit/delete all of the passwords that it has saved. Not as useful as being able to temporarily lock them, but I can easily export them to a text file on a removable drive, for later restoration, and then delete them.
Safari draws passwords from an "Autofill" item it places in Keychain Access, and it would seem logical for Firefox to do the same thing. You don't see a "Firefox" item in KA?


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Disable all passwords temporarily
artie505 #57430 12/24/20 05:24 AM
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Searching for either Firefox or Mozilla in KA turns up nothing. Since Firefox is a cross platform app, they probably don't make use of KA. After changing the KA password to something different than my acct login password, Safari now asks me to login to KA, but Firefox doesn't, and Firefox still has all of its web passwords. So, I'll have to delete them separately.


MacBook Pro 15" (2015)
Sierra 10.12.6
Re: Disable all passwords temporarily
Bob_00001 #57431 12/24/20 09:09 AM
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Thanks for the follow-up...good info.

Particularly in today's security conscious environment, I"m surprised that Firefox doesn't provide some mechanism for securing your passwords.

I'd file a feature request.


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Disable all passwords temporarily
artie505 #57435 12/24/20 09:45 PM
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Considering all of the security breaches that you hear about in the news, I've come to the conclusion that what these companies say and do are two different things.


MacBook Pro 15" (2015)
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Re: Disable all passwords temporarily
Bob_00001 #57436 12/24/20 09:55 PM
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Originally Posted by Bob_00001
Considering all of the security breaches that you hear about in the news, I've come to the conclusion that what these companies say and do are two different things.
That notwithstanding, this is such BASIC security that I find it difficult to believe that it's been overlooked.


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Disable all passwords temporarily
artie505 #57437 12/24/20 10:32 PM
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Originally Posted by artie505
Originally Posted by Bob_00001
Considering all of the security breaches that you hear about in the news, I've come to the conclusion that what these companies say and do are two different things.
That notwithstanding, this is such BASIC security that I find it difficult to believe that it's been overlooked.
So I went looking and found that Firefox offers a "primary password" option (under Prefs > Privacy & Security) that sounds like a satisfactory solution.


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Disable all passwords temporarily
artie505 #57438 12/25/20 12:15 AM
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Thanks for that. It's exactly what I was looking for.
I guess I didn't scroll down far enough to see the primary password setup. But then, I've been in a rush to get this computer secured in case it suddenly fails.


MacBook Pro 15" (2015)
Sierra 10.12.6
Re: Disable all passwords temporarily
Bob_00001 #57444 12/26/20 12:48 AM
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I'm wondering how people deal with the problem now that dual KA passwords are no longer an option?

Must everybody who hasn't got a good memory purchase an app?

And then again, I doubt that all that many people took advantage of the option when it was an option. How did they deal with the problem pre-apps?


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Disable all passwords temporarily
artie505 #57445 12/26/20 01:13 AM
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Originally Posted by artie505
How did they deal with the problem pre-apps?
Many people I know kept keep a post-it note with the three or four passwords they used use for everything, stuck on the monitor or they have only one password (
password
).


If we knew what it was we were doing, it wouldn't be called research, would it?

— Albert Einstein
Re: Disable all passwords temporarily
joemikeb #57446 12/26/20 01:30 AM
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So their passwords never get to Keychain Access. What could be more secure?

(Your spoiler didn't come through.)


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Disable all passwords temporarily
Bob_00001 #57448 12/26/20 02:36 PM
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Originally Posted by Bob_00001
Safari, seems to be mostly secure now, although it still remembers my bank card number, which is somewhat disturbing, but it doesn't remember the password.
The fact that Safari remembers anything about something as personal as banking is indeed disturbing. How do you know that it does that?


ryck

"What Were Once Vices Are Now Habits" The Doobie Brothers

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Re: Disable all passwords temporarily
ryck #57449 12/26/20 04:36 PM
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If you go to Safari > Preferences > Autofill and select Credit Cards, Edit..., you can see which cards Safari remembers. You can change or delete any of them from there.


Jon

macOS 11.7.10, iMac Retina 5K 27-inch, late 2014, 3.5 GHz Intel Core i5, 1 TB fusion drive, 16 GB RAM, Epson SureColor P600, Photoshop CC, Lightroom CC, MS Office 365
Re: Disable all passwords temporarily
artie505 #57450 12/26/20 05:04 PM
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Originally Posted by artie505
(Your spoiler didn't come through.)
confused are you saying that when you click on it password is not revealed? confused


If we knew what it was we were doing, it wouldn't be called research, would it?

— Albert Einstein
Re: Disable all passwords temporarily
joemikeb #57452 12/26/20 05:34 PM
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Originally Posted by joemikeb
Originally Posted by artie505
(Your spoiler didn't come through.)
confused are you saying that when you click on it password is not revealed? confused
Oops! My eyes played a trick on me.

You posted
Quote
...or they have only one password (
password
)
and when "password" was revealed, the second instance didn't register.


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Disable all passwords temporarily
jchuzi #57455 12/26/20 11:04 PM
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Originally Posted by jchuzi
If you go to Safari > Preferences > Autofill and select Credit Cards, Edit..., you can see which cards Safari remembers. You can change or delete any of them from there.
Thanks for the guidance....I checked and have none saved. Whew!


ryck

"What Were Once Vices Are Now Habits" The Doobie Brothers

iMac (Retina 5K, 27", 2020), 3.8 GHz 8 Core Intel Core i7, 8GB RAM, 2667 MHz DDR4
OS Ventura 13.6.3
Canon Pixma TR 8520 Printer
Epson Perfection V500 Photo Scanner c/w VueScan software
TM on 1TB LaCie USB-C
Re: Disable all passwords temporarily
ryck #57475 12/29/20 06:16 AM
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Originally Posted by ryck
Originally Posted by Bob_00001
Safari, seems to be mostly secure now, although it still remembers my bank card number, which is somewhat disturbing, but it doesn't remember the password.
The fact that Safari remembers anything about something as personal as banking is indeed disturbing. How do you know that it does that?

When I go to my bank's login page, Safari enters the card number. I suspect that safari doesn't actually know that it's my bank card number. My bank's website uses my card number as my sign-in account number, making the bank at least partly to blame. So, when I go to my bank's website, Safari probably just thinks it's auto-entering a user name. I doubt that anyone could do very much with the number, because it's a chip card, and would still need a PIN number to go with it. I'll check the other suggestions about removing credit card numbers and see if that works.

I could probably just remove Safari from my computer altogether, considering that I hardly ever use it. Ever since Firefox brought out its major upgrade a few years ago, I've been very happy with it, and have only used Safari on extremely rare occasions when I encounter a cantankerous website.

BTW, the one drawback of setting the KA password different from the login password is that now when I log in, I get hit with a barrage of requests from various system utilities that want to access the keychain.

Last edited by Bob_00001; 12/29/20 06:19 AM.

MacBook Pro 15" (2015)
Sierra 10.12.6

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