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Secure Your Firefox Passwords

// March 7th, 2006 // Technology

Most people probably don’t realize that when they elect to have Firefox remember passwords they enter for restricted-access websites, by default those passwords are stored in plaintext and available to anyone with physical access to the user account and system.

To view them, simply go to Tools->Options (Edit->Preferences on Linux/Mac). Select the Privacy Tab. Expand the Saved Passwords section. Then choose “View Saved Passwords”. Then “Show Passwords”… and there they are.

The solution to this is to do what most people never do – set a “Master Password” in Firefox.

You can do this by going to Tools->Options (Edit->Preferences on Linux/Mac). Select the Privacy Tab. Expand the Saved Passwords section. Then choose “Set Master Password” and follow the directions to set the Master Password.

After this, once per browser session, when navigating to a restricted-access site for which you’ve saved a password in Firefox, you’ll be prompted for the “Master Password”. Entering it successfully will pre-populate the saved password information into the form on the page.

Read more at Digg.