Passwords saved in Chrome are shown in your Google Account in Plaintext

Amin Shah Gilani
1 min readMay 24, 2017

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Don’t use Chrome’s built in Password manager, it syncs to your Google Account where passwords are viewable in plaintext. Have you ever saved a password in Chrome, even accidentally? Go to passwords.google.com

All the passwords you’ve ever saved

Ever given your Google password because you couldn’t access your email? They can wire your savings to themselves.

Just got out of a serious relationship? Your ex probably piggybacks off your Netflix subscription, and stalks your instagram.

Why is this a problem?

  • I’ve seen a real world case where a Google account compromise led to a takeover of social media accounts unrelated to the address.. this was the only place where the passwords were stored
  • This defeats resetting the victim’s password to gain entry into their accounts, and allows for “silent” stalking after obtaining the Google password.

How do I protect myself?

Read my guide, and use LastPass:

Disclosure:

  • May 18: Contacted Google and proposed short-term solutions
  • May 18: Google triaged and put into queue
  • May 24: Not considered a security bug.. oh well.

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Amin Shah Gilani
Amin Shah Gilani

Written by Amin Shah Gilani

Founder. Developer. Spaces over tabs. Atom over your favorite X.

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