With Windows 8, I’m still trying to decide how I want to manage my passwords
Like many people, I have a lot of accounts with various websites and digital services. For years, I kept a database of all of my passwords so I could keep track of all of my accounts and easily remember passwords. Eventually, I wizened up and switched to a more secure multi-platform service like LastPass. While I’m not a fan of the plug-in model, it made managing things much easier and it allowed me to give each and every account a unique and completely random password. The downside to such a service, however, is that it requires a browser which supports plug-ins.
Microsoft specifically avoided support for plug-ins in the “Metro” version of Windows 8’s Internet Explorer 10. The desktop browser still supports plug-ins, but this requires the ability to install desktop applications – something that Windows RT doesn’t support either. So this leaves me with a problem: I like the security and convenience of LastPass, but my future Windows RT tablet will only support the newly-released LastPass app, not the desktop application. The app is all well and good, but to really get the most out of it, you have to use it as your primary web browser – something that I’m not willing to do.
I could use Windows 8’s new Credential Manager, but I’m not sure if I want to switch over to it completely. Although it does have the added benefit of automatically being synced across Windows 8 devices and – hopefully – Windows Phone 8 as well. For now, I’m using a hybrid solution of sorts, where I store frequent websites in the Credential Manager and use LastPass as the main password repository. How do you manage your passwords?
