In recent months, I’ve gotten involved in a number of interesting and exciting projects.
Trouble is, they all involve sets of logins and passwords. Some have assigned logins and passwords, so I can’t use the usual combinations. Even before the new set of projects, my standard procedure for infrequently-used services had degenerated into to using the hint and getting a new password every single time!
I have completely scaled out of the creaky password management methods I’ve had till now.
I need a forearm-based implant that stores all my passwords, so I have them with me, whether or not I have access to any particular computing device.
Or maybe something a little less extreme.
How about a bracelet, with an LCD readout and a scroll-wheel that you can use to select System:Username:Password combinations?
There could be fashionable versions (precious metals, licensed characters). There could be simple versions, like medical alert tags, that guys could feel comfortable with.
Anybody know a good cyborgification service. Or a designer and contract manufacturer?
Or a better idea for managing more passwords than my simple brain can hold?
1. Roboform, http://roboform.com (IE/Moz)
2. PINS, http://www.mirekw.com /winfreeware /pins.html
3. Floppy or USB flash drive to store encrypted data for above apps. PINS is small enough to run directly from portable media.
Cool. A keychain drive solves the problem — the keys are always around even if you’re not near a given computer with a given level of internet access.
Come to think of it, it’s the right answer for the right reason. Keep the physical keys with the information keys, and know where the keys are at all times.
Thanks, Rich.
Another option is to keep the passwords on a PDA. Surely somebody’s written password-management software for the Palm by now. And is the Rex still around? It was a credit-card-sized PDA which slid straight into a PCMCIA slot. Maybe USB ports have made it obsolete, but the size and format made the Rex suitable for keeping in your wallet, pretty much as failsafe as a keychain.
Of course, with PDAs and highly sensitive passwords you’ve got the question of the security of the system on which you do your backups. I used to keep passwords on an HP palmtop which I backed up only to its own removeable media, which was fine until the now-obsolete palmtop died on me one day and I had to decide which was less of a pain, starting over with my passwords or getting another antique palmtop. I started over collecting passwords.
I really like your jewelry idea. But the intersection of people who need a wearable password cache (or other data store — it could as easily be an addressbook) and people who would wear the same piece of jewelry *every* day may be too small to make this one fly.