Why You Should Not Rely on Firefox's Master Password

Like most of the browsers, Firefox offers to save your passwords and then auto-fill the blanks later on whenever you access a specific website. It surely saves your time, and you no longer need to remember long alphanumeric sequences for every single website that you register on. What's more, it is possible to use a password manager provided by the browser to protect your personal information from other people who might be using the same computer. Nevertheless, there are certain security concerns associated with the Firefox master password, and we would like to address them in this blog post.

How Does Firefox Password Manager Work?

According to the Firefox support center, with the Firefox Password Manager, you can store your passwords and usernames that you use to access a number of websites. Firefox automatically "remembers" your passwords when you enter them for the first time on the browser. The moment you try to access a particular website, you will see a pop-up box that asks you whether you want Firefox to save login for that website. Needless to say, you can also choose to not save the passwords, and it is nice that you are not forced to use the Firefox password manager whether you like it or not.

Aside from auto-filling your login details whenever you access a certain website, Firefox also allows you to review and delete the saved passwords through the Privacy & Security panel in the Options menu. It's great if you are the only one who's using the browser on your device, but what if there are more people who use your computer? You most definitely would not want them to see your passwords if they decide to check your Privacy & Security settings. Well, this is where the Firefox master password comes into the picture. Firefox offers you to protect your personal data with the master password feature.

What Does Firefox Master Password Do?

It is very common that several members of the same family might share the same computer. So if several individuals use the same browser, and you have your passwords saved in the Firefox settings, you would not want anyone to see that personal information. In such a case, Firefox suggests using the Firefox Master Password.

If you go to the Privacy & Security settings within the Firefox Options menu, you will see the Use a master password option in the panel. If you select the option, you can set your master password. When everything is set and ready, the “Password Required” dialog box will pop up each time you try to access your passwords stored in the Firefox password manager. This gives an impression that Firefox gives you all the tools necessary to protect your personal information from anyone (besides you) seeing it.

However, as mentioned in the first paragraph, there are a number of security concerns associated with the Firefox Master Password, and we would like to shed light on a few of them, as pointed out by Wladimir Palant.

What Might Go Wrong With Firefox Password Manager?

The main problem with the Firefox master password doesn't have anything to do with who might sit down in front of your computer. It's about who might crack the password from the cyberspace. Palant suggests that one of the main aspects of password security is how that password translates into an encryption key. The stronger is the encryption, the smaller is the chance that someone might crack it open.

Storing your passwords in Firefox password manager without the master password is practically the same as storing them in plain-text. However, there are bound to be certain problems with the master password, too. When the master password gets encrypted, Firefox uses the SHA-1 hashing to do that. Now, it may not mean much to the average computer user, but the point is that this method could be cracked using brute force.

Brute force is a type of hacking when a computer calculates all the possible password variations until it guesses the right one. Computer security experts always point out that brute force attacks are especially dangerous these days because it takes mere seconds for powerful CPUs to calculate billions of password versions. Likewise, a powerful brute force attack can calculate up to 8.5 billion passwords SHA-1 hashes per second. That's just how many passwords it can check in a mere second. And if a user doesn't have a strong password (which is usually the case), it might take less than a minute to crack the master password.

So the problem is not the master password itself, but the encryption method applied by Firefox. While regular users should not be able to hack it any time soon, anyone with enough resources could crack the code without much effort. Therefore, it clearly shows that users should employ more tools to protect their sensitive information from malicious exploitation.

How to Apply a Third-Party Password Manager?

We would like to recommend using Cyclonis Password Manager to protect your passwords. In fact, it's not just about protecting your data. It's also about making your web browsing and accessing various sites a more convenient experience. You can import all of your Firefox (and other browsers) passwords into Cyclonis, and keep them safe in your personal password vault.

Or perhaps you have a feeling that your passwords aren't strong enough? No problem. Cyclonis will generate strong and unique passwords for every single account you have, and it will remember them all for you! You will only need to memorize one single master password that will keep all your data under one strong lock. And if you are not good at changing your passwords regularly, Cyclonis will remind you to do that as well. So in a sense, you will have one single key that will work across different platforms.

And don't worry about Cyclonis master password's encryption. The program generates a unique 256-bit encryption key using PKCS5_PBKDF2 and HMAC_DRBG. It is a one-way process, and it cannot be reversed. The program further uses the 256-bit Advanced Encryption Standard algorithm, so you can be sure that your password vault is safe and sound.