Sticky Password Cloud 7 review: The ideal solution for password management across platforms

It's a multi-device world. It's not uncommon to have a work PC, a home PC, a smartphone, and a tablet, often with different operating systems. It's also an increasingly insecure world, where every week seems to bring news of a new data breach.

With more and more day-to-day work moving from the desktop to the browser, and the expectation of a seamless shift as you move from one platform to another, these two facts converge dangerously: A password shared among multiple sites means all of your data, and perhaps your entire online identity, is only as safe as the most poorly-secured site you visit. Sticky Password can help.

Sticky Password will alert you to passwords you might consider changing.

Sticky Password Cloud runs as a standalone application under Windows, but also integrates itself into multiple browsers. The user can exclude some supported browsers, if desired. It also has Droid and iOS apps, all of which can share a common database of passwords, memos, and so on, through your personal, albeit unfortunately named, StickyPortal. When a new device attempts to connect to the shared cloud data, a one-time PIN is sent to the email address used when you set up the account.

Sticky Password helps you manage dozens, or hundreds, of passwords. You don't need to remember a thing -- except your master password for Sticky Password itself, of course. While Sticky Password doesn't force you to use a different password for each site, it makes it very easy to do so. It recognizes (most) login or account setup screens, and if it sees something that looks like it's asking you for a password, it can generate one, including mixed case, numbers, and symbols.

Random passwords foil dictionary and pattern-based attacks.

Sticky Password integrates well with most major PC browsers. It appears as a clickable icon in the menu bar or status bar (depending on browser and preference), and thankfully does not add a toolbar. Support for browser upgrades is prompt. Sticky Password is very actively supported; the company recognizes that this is a vital utility to its users and, in my experience, reported bugs are addressed promptly.

An obvious downside is that if your Sticky Password database is lost (through catastrophic drive failure, for example), you may be in serious trouble. There are some solutions to this: You can do an export (plain or encrypted) of your password database, and store this in a secondary location (if it's not encrypted, it better be very secure). Further, it produces backup database files regularly. You can back these files up (or make sure your favorite backup program or service, such as Carbonite, includes them), instead of doing an export yourself. And, with Sticky Password Cloud, you can now sync your passwords across multiple devices, with the encrypted data stored remotely. The user is in control of if data is synced.

This is something each user must weigh carefully. Any time all your information passes through a single bottleneck, there's a risk. No matter how secure the servers are, there is always a chance of an unknown exploit being discovered, or a user error leaving an opening. On the other hand, failing to use unique passwords on each site opens up even more points of risk.

Sticky Password allows organization into folders, helpful for large databases.

Sticky Password Cloud adds in a few new features beyond the cloud functionality. Lamantine Software has added grouping for secure memos, improved support for import of bookmarks and passwords from additional browsers, and updated Sticky Password Cloud to the latest look and feel.

Licensing for Sticky Password Cloud is a bit unusual: It covers all devices for a single user for one fee, 20.00, which is good, but it must be renewed annually, which is less good. For those who are not multi-device users or who do not want syncing, there is Sticky Password Desktop, which has no time limits on its license, and no cloud functionality.

Lamantine Software donates a portion of Sticky Password Cloud sales to helping endangered manatees (Oh, the huge manatees!).

Keith Ramos

How often can you protect both data and aquatic mammals? Not often!

Sticky Password is a permanent part of my computing life. I have been using it day in and day out for two years now, and I have encountered only small issues, rapidly resolved. If you are using another password management tool, compare feature sets. If you aren't using a password management tool, you should be, and Sticky Password is one of the best.

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F-Secure Key review: An excessively simple password manager for absolute beginners

You too need a password manager, and if you're not yet using one, you should. A good password manager makes it simple to securely store your most important information, and access it whenever and wherever you need it. An excellent password manager is both easy to use and secure, with smart cross-platform features that streamline your password usage without compromising your safety. KeePass does this, LastPass does this, and so does Dashlane. The new F-Secure Key's challenge is to do it better.

F-Secure Key (free for basic version, $16/year for Premium) is a new password manager by security company F-Secure. The free PC edition of F-Secure Key—editions for Android, iPhone, and Mac exist as well—is a local one with no online synchronization. The interface is clean and simple, and creating new password entries is intuitive. Importing a database from another manager is also easy enough, providing you know how to export an XML file from your old manager. Similar to other password managers, F-Secure uses the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES-256) algorithm for its password encryption.

With its icons and colors, F-Secure Key is much nicer to look at than most password managers.

Each F-Secure Key entry can get one of several dozens of icons, as well as a color code. The password generator can help you with secure passwords of up to 32 characters, using any combination of letters, numbers and symbols. It is, however, limited when compared to other managers. The entire interface, complete with cute little icons and color codes, is visually pleasing, but unfortunately, there's no way to use these icons or colors to your advantage. Your password list is searchable by keyword, but you can't filter out a color or a certain icon. There are no password groups or categories, and no way to sort the list or otherwise filter certain types of passwords from the mass.

The password generator is effective, but lacks fine-tuned control over the final result.

When it comes to more advanced features, F-Secure Key lacks them almost completely. There's no way to control the app's auto-locking or clipboard cleaning features; the auto-login feature is very limited, and the hotkeys that do exist are hidden in the help files and are inconvenient to use; there's no indication of how secure your chosen passwords are; and unlike competitors such as Dashlane, there's no option to automatically create entries when logging into new websites. F-Secure's cross-device synchronization is a premium feature which feels secure enough, but is also a bit confusing to set up.

When logging in to a website, you can choose the relevant password from a dropdown menu.

On the upside, F-Secure Key does come from a good home. Backed by a serious security lab, F-Secure Key comes with a nice built-in news feed with updates about recent hacks and passwords thefts. While this feature is not unique to F-Secure Key, it feels good to know the data is obtained in-house.

F-Secure Key is an extremely simple password manager, and one that even the less tech-savvy can learn how to use. It does, however, lack in useful features, which renders it useless for more advanced users. F-Secure Key is a definite step up from a password notebook sitting on your desk, but aside from this secure simplicity, it doesn't offer anything its competitors don't already do better. If you're already using a different password manager such as Lastpass, KeePass or Dashlane, stick with it.

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Review: Dashlane is a robust password manager with a gorgeous interface

Dashlane With its simple interface and myriad of features, Dashlane is a powerful password manager anyone should consider.

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A password manager is a must. Unless you're using the same password for everything (not recommended) or have a truly phenomenal memory, your productivity can benefit from a place to store all your passwords and easily use them whenever necessary. There are several strong players in this field, such as LastPass and KeePass. Dashlane (free for basic version, $20/year for Premium) aims to take on both.

Dashlane is a robust password manager with additional room for your various IDs, credit cards and other payment methods, receipts, and notes. It comes with an auto-fill feature for online forms to which you can add different addresses, phone numbers, and other personal information you're tired of typing repeatedly. There are two features that make Dashlane stand out when compared to both LastPass and KeePass: Its beautiful and easy-to-use interface, and its optional cloud syncing.

The Security Dashboard analyzes your database, alerting you of weak, recurring, or breached passwords

Setting up Dashlane is exceptionally easy. LastPass and KeePass are both fairly easy to use, but they have nothing on Dashlane. The installation process takes you step by step through setting up the program, with clear instructions and smooth guidance. After choosing your master password for Dashlane--unlike LastPass, there's no "password reminder" here, so you must remember it or lose access to your database--Dashlane will install itself on your browsers (Firefox, Chrome and Internet Explorer are supported), and will lead you through trying out its different features and interface elements.

If you're already using a different password manager, you can import your database into Dashlane pretty easily. The import tool supports databases from Firefox, Chrome, Internet Explorer, LastPass, 1Password, RoboForm, PasswordWallet, KeePess, and custom CSV files, but the tool is a little finicky. For example, my KeePass CSV did not contain a filled-in URL field, as this is not mandatory in KeePass. Dashlane ignored every password that did not come with a URL, leaving me with no way to import my large password database into Dashlane. Fortunately, Dashlane can automatically add new credentials upon logging in to websites, so after using it for several days, most of my oft-used passwords were transferred to Dashlane without much effort on my part.

On every new login, Dashlane will offer to automatically save your credentials

Dashlane's strong yet subtle browser integration makes logging in to websites a seamless operation, but doesn't add unnecessary clutter to your browsing experience. Once a password is stored in Dashlane, it can log you in automatically every time the website is loaded, or auto-fill the credentials without logging you in. If you're opening an account on a new website, Dashlane can generate a strong password for you right from your browser, and store it in your database in one fell swoop.

You can categorize passwords and other information for easy access, and a small blue impala icon in a browser text field will alert you to the fact that Dashlane can auto-fill this for you. If you have more than one account with a website, more than one email address you like to use, etc., clicking the blue impala will open a dropdown menu where you can choose the desired information.

One of the most important aspects of a password manager is security, and with Dashlane, you can select your level of paranoia. Your database is encrypted with AES-256 encryption, only you know the master password to decrypt it, and you can enable Google Authenticator for extra security. Unlike LastPass, where everything is in the cloud, automatic cloud syncing and backup is a Premium feature in Dashlane, so free users don't have to worry about it.

Even if you're a paid customer, however, you can easily opt out of cloud syncs, meaning your password database is only stored locally, just like with KeePass. Unlike KeePass, though, Dashlane's free mobile apps can be managed as separate databases, so you can access your passwords on the go without worrying about constant cloud syncs. When enabled, Dashlane syncs happen every 5 minutes, and there's no way to control or reduce this frequency.

The Premium version also includes Web access to your data from any browser, anywhere

Dashlane is an impressive password manager with some excellent features and a beautiful interface. It does require a certain amount of trust in the company, especially when using its syncing options, and for $20/year, its Premium version is expensive when compared to the alternatives. Nevertheless, it is the perfect password manager for the less tech-savvy, and even the experienced are sure to enjoy it, if only for the merits of its interface. It's available in Android, iOS, and Mac editions, in addition to the PC edition I reviewed.

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Review: SafeWallet makes password storage pretty easy

I love password managers. When they work well, they make browsing the Web easier, faster, and more secure. And SafeWallet does, indeed, work well. It's not perfect, but SafeWallet has become my new favorite password manager.

SafeWallet makes it easy to access the details on the account logins you've stored.

To get started, you simply create an account by entering your email address and selecting a password. You then setup a safety question, enter your birthdate, and you're good to go. SafeWallet works as an extension for the Chrome, Firefox, and Internet Explorer browsers and you can choose which ones you'd like to add during the installation.

The installation didn't work quite as well as I'd hoped. While the Firefox and IE extensions were added automatically, I had to manually locate the Chrome extension in Chrome's Web store and install it myself. Luckily, that process was easy.

Equally easy is surfing the Web with SafeWallet. It automatically detects most login pages and forms that you fill out and asks you if you'd like to remember that information in your SafeWallet. You can access your SafeWallet either by clicking on the icon that appears in your browser's toolbar or by launching the program from your computer's start menu. Both of these steps will open up the SafeWallet interface, which is attractive and easy to understand. All of the Website logins you've saved are listed there, and you can drag and drop them to categories such as "Business" and "Personal." You also can mark some as Favorites, which makes it easy to find those that you use frequently.

Overall, the layout of SafeWallet is easier to browse that LastPass's Vault, which is a bit too text-heavy for my taste. Still, I do like how LastPass lets you create your own categories for sorting all of your logins (something SafeWallet lacks).

SafeWallet recognizes most login pages and offers to remember the information for you.

And SafeWallet did hiccup a few times on multi-page logins, as do most password managers I've tested. But unlike LastPass, which managed to identify the second page of a two-page login system that my banking site uses, SafeWallet didn't recognize either page. I had to manually add the site to my SafeWallet myself, which is simple.

I was able to forget about that minor flaw when I saw how seamlessly SafeWallet handles multiple accounts for a single site or service. I have a personal Google account and a professional Google account, and SafeWallet made it a cinch to store and use both of them.  SafeWallet's interface lists both the name of the site and the username, making it easy to see at a glance which is which. LastPass's Vault lists only the name of the service, making me click on each Google entry in order to see which one contains the information for my personal or work accounts.

Similarly, when you browse to the Google site, LastPass fills in the username and password fields with the login you most recently used; you have to go back to your vault in order to find the other one. SafeWallet, though, lets you select the login to use right on the Webpage itself, with a handy drop-down option that lets you make the switch. It's incredibly handy.

So, too, is the fact that SafeWallet is now free. In a change from earlier versions, the company has decided to offer it free of charge. That includes the mobile versions, which run on iOS and Android devices. LastPass offers mobile versions, too, but only as part of its $1-per-month Premium service.

If SafeWallet fails to recognize a login page, you can enter your details manually.

I wish SafeWallet worked more seamlessly with multi-page logins, but the rest of its features are enough to make me overlook that issue. From now on, I'm storing my logins in my SafeWallet.

Note: The Download button takes you to the vendor's site, where you can download the latest version of the software.

Liane Cassavoy is a veteran technology and business journalist. She contributes regularly to PCWorld and has written about business issues and products for Entrepreneur Magazine and other publications. She is the author of two business start-up guides published by Entrepreneur Press.
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Review: Sticky Password Pro is a valuable tool for keeping passwords safe

If you use the same user name and password on multiple sites, all it takes is for one of them to get cracked, and it doesn't matter how secure your password is or how securely all the other sites store it: You are in trouble. So, you should use a different secure password for each site. Of course, trying to remember dozens or hundreds of different secure passwords borders on impossible.

Sticky Password Pro ($30, 30-day free trial) helps solve this problem. It integrates smoothly with most browsers (and many other applications, such as Skype and Thunderbird), and tracks all of your logins and passwords for you. While many browsers have password managers, Sticky Password has features that go far beyond, and it keeps the same set of logins available to multiple browsers. I can flip between Opera and Firefox and not worry about which one I might have created the password in.

Further, Sticky Password Pro has a password generator which can provide a suitably-randomized string of gibberish according to an assortment of rules: length, characters included, and so on.

Sticky Password's folders help keep things organized, but the excellent browser integration means you rarely need to manually find things.

Accounts can be easily searched in Sticky Password's main window, simply by typing in some portion of either the login or the site. Those who prefer a less ad-hoc method will be pleased with Sticky Password's ability to organize and group your data, so you can sort logins and passwords into work, personal, etc, groups.

Sticky Password 6.0 offers a new interface that makes it easier to move between different categories of stored data. It also adds new features, such as bookmark management, and the ability to export subsets of passwords for sharing—for example, a set of passwords associated with accounts at your job can be exported for coworkers.

Another helpful feature is the ability to exclude specific sites. While Sticky Password works seamlessly most of the time, there are occasional places where an odd interface or non-standard practices cause it to break, which can cause frustration. The ability to do site-by-site exclusion is a useful bit of new functionality.

In general, Sticky Password Pro has maintained a rapid schedule of bug fixes and compatibility updates. However, during the course of testing for this review, I experienced two severe bugs. Both were resolved, but they need to be mentioned. First, I was experiencing constant Firefox crashes when I upgraded to v.18. Sticky Password was listed as compatible, so it took a while before I found out it was the culprit, rendering Firefox effectively unusable. Second, while testing the bookmark feature, my computer would spike CPU usage and hang, forcing me to reboot. This turned out to be related to an issue with Opera passwords, which required me to purge my Opera info. The Firefox bug is fixed in the current version of Sticky Password; the Opera bug remains a known, albeit rare, issue.

I've been using Sticky Password for years with no issues, so it's not generally unstable or buggy, and I am not going to stop using it unless I start seeing issues arise a lot more frequently. It's an excellent product that, if used regularly to generate and manage unique passwords for each site, can reduce the risks of having a single hacked server expose multiple accounts.

Note: The Download button on the Product Information page will download the software to your system.

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New Windows 7 and 8 Key Makes Password Hints Easy to Crack from Afar

A key called “UserPassWordHint” may be the most obviously named methods of attempt to break into machines that run Windows 7 and 8.

Although the password hints are hashed with additional zeros, they aren’t encrypted, and can be determined fairly easily using a short script.

This all came to light when SpiderLabs vulnerability researcher Jonathan Claudius began poking around to see how the new Windows system behaved.

 ”I was a little disappointed thinking that the hint was encrypted in some way until I noticed the pattern of zeros,” Claudius wrote on the SpiderLabs blog.  Upon determining a pattern, however, he “wrote a little decoder in Ruby to see if I could learn this user’s password hint.”

It worked. Although still unreadable, Claudius had the eight-line script added to the popular open source Metasploit tool kit’s hash dump tools. The lightly encrypted results were then decrypted into plain text.

This all seems very disconcerting, until you realize that they’re just hints.

Although they could be helpful to a hacker, they’re not nearly as precious as the passwords themselves which, fortunately, are much more difficult to crack.

Anyone with physical access to a PC can access password hints with the click of a mouse, but until now, password hints were much more difficult to obtain by remote intruders. While they could definitely come in handy to a sophisticated hacker, they’d likely go straight for the password from the start. Hints are the territory of jealous boyfriends and prank-pulling siblings who want to snoop through emails or post embarrassing Facebook statuses.

Article provided by SecurityNewsDaily, a sister site to Laptopmag.com. 

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Lock Down Your Log-in: 6 Password Managers to Protect Your Accounts

For those of you with a different password for every account, these six downloads can be your digital safe. Each program remembers all of your log-ins so you don’t have to and some include data protection for good measure. Want to know the best tools to keep your passwords safe? Read on.

Available in both desktop and mobile versions, eWallet secures your passwords with 256-bit encryption. eWallet takes its name seriously; customization options let you assign credit card-style backgrounds to different login credentials. The software can sync across your devices, and Android users can view their desktop “wallet” of login information on their phone.
Price: $9.99 (smartphone), $19.99 (PC), $29.98 (PC and smartphone); http://www.ilumsoft.com/ewallet

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