4 ms·

Can someone help me with 2 questions: Question 1: Can someone comment on the actual severity of them storing all my passwords remotely? I don't like the idea o

• ttul 9y ago
  Your passwords are encrypted using a master password that you enter in the desktop app. They do not know your passwords.
  • Exuma 9y ago
    But can you brute force my vault using similar techniques as just brute forcing a stolen DB of hashed passwords... in other words, if your vault password is < 6 characters are you screwed? Or are the vault passwords more 'battle hardened'
    • raverbashing 9y ago
      Well, yes if you set your vault password to be less than 6 characters I don't think there are any miracles that can guarantee the safety of your data, unless they use PBKDF2 with 10e10 iterations or something similar
    • rickyc091 9y ago
      A while back I recall AgileBits pushing a blog about their security. While this one isn't from them directly, it reinforces the notion that they slow down the number of passwords you can brute force by increasing the number of rounds. Edit >> Forgot to post the link to the article https://blog.elcomsoft.com/2017/08/attacking-the-1password-master-password-follow-up/ https://blog.elcomsoft.com/2017/08/attacking-the-1password-m...
    • FreezerburnV 9y ago
      Vaults stores on their servers are encrypted with a two secret system: one secret is your password, a second secret is a large, random string. So even if your vault password is weak, it should still keep the vault safe. Neither of these secrets are stored by them.
    • eterm 9y ago
      Your vault password should have a similar amount of entropy to the encryption strength, it's one of the good uses of a diceware passphrase, where I'd recommend 8+ words for the encryption passphrase. It's the only thing you'll have to remember, so while a pass phrase that length would normally be a hurdle, it isn't hard to remember. It'll be a pain to type at first but you'll get muscle memory before too long. 6 Characters? If your master password is only 6 characters then yes, you are screwed if your vault leaks.
      • Exuma 9y ago
        So you are saying to come up with 8 random words and chain them together? Wouldn't 4 or 6 work? (Like the one comic about correct horse battery staple)
        • starpilot 9y ago
          They don't have to be random. For example, you could use an HN comment, like this one.
      • roustem 9y ago
        Not really. Your data would be safe even with 6 character master password (which will not be allowed by 1Password). The random Secret Key provides the additional protection against brute forcing accounts even when the master password is weak.
        • eterm 9y ago
          Correct me if I'm wrong, but the random secret key must be synchronised somehow, surely? I'm talking about in the case that someone gains access to all your synchronised data.
          • latexr 9y ago
            The process of encrypting a password is one-way, meaning that given an encrypted password you can’t run a process to get the original. For an attacker to guess your password, they need to run a bunch of guesses through the same encryption process, and only when they get the same encrypted result they’ll know they have the correct unencrypted one. This is time consuming, so attackers may use rainbow tables[1] — essentially a list with a ton of precomputed passwords they can check. To counteract this you salt[2] a password, essentially adding random data to it. So now even if we have the same password, since our salt (random data) will be different, the resulting encrypted version will also be different. Even if the attacker gets your vault and secret key, they’ll still need to brute-force[3] the password. Ars Technica’s has an excellent explanation of all this[4]. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rainbow_table https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rainbow_table [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt_(cryptography) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt_(cryptography) [3]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brute-force_attack https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brute-force_attack [4]: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/05/how-crackers-make-minced-meat-out-of-your-passwords/ https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/05/how-c...
    • aerotwelve 9y ago
      Any time you try to unlock a vault by providing a password, 1Password's infrastructure has to run it (along with other inputs) through 100,000 iterations of a hash function to derive a key. Many password managers nowadays do something like this, because it makes every guess more expensive (linearly I suppose?). This is, of course, no substitute for a nice long password whose characters are members of the largest alphabet you can think of, but it's something. I'm not qualified to analyze a security system in detail, but 1Password have published the mechanism they use to secure vaults. You might want to check it out for more details: https://1password.com/files/1Password%20for%20Teams%20White%20Paper.pdf https://1password.com/files/1Password%20for%20Teams%20White%...
  • roustem 9y ago
    The key used to protect the data (before it is sent to 1Password.com) is generated as 100,000 iterations of PBKDF2-HMAC-256(Master Password + Secret Key). The most important part here is the Secret Key which provides additional 128 bits of entropy. https://1password.com/security/ https://1password.com/security/