6 ms·
An exploit can reveal your KeePass master password in plaintext
- opan 3y ago>KeePassXC... which are other password managers compatible with KeePass database files, are not affected according to vdohney. Great.
- dotancohen 3y agoYes, that's the one I use anyway. Great integration with most Linux desktops - a keyboard shortcut brings the target window to the top and enters the username and password right into the proper fields.
- psychphysic 3y agoAlthough KeePassXC offers better process memory protection, it also can not help if you hibernate and the memory is written to disk. Hardware password managers exist and are not so inconvenient.
- mook 3y agoIsn't it usually set to re-lock on screen lock (which typically happens before hibernate)?
- Schnitz 3y agoIsn’t that a mostly moot point if you also use full disk encryption like File Vault?
- fbdab103 3y agoNot that it is a panacea, but you can/should configure Keepass to autolock the database after inactivity. I believe the default is something like 4 minutes, which should kick in before any kind of hibernation or paging would occur.
- paulryanrogers 3y agoThen you have to type the whole password again or your auto-type and plugins don't work. If you keep it open all day for random login needs then this can be a hassle. Full disclosure, I sell a paid KP2 plugin to soft lock the UI. (It won't protect memory or dumps but does prevent naive snooping.)
- ajuc 3y agoI think it's time to change the 90s-inspired security recommendations. I work from home. I feel much safer with my password written on a piece of paper than with a password manager. God forbid the password manager is cloud-enabled.
- daveoc64 3y agoAren't you incredibly vulnerable to Credential Stuffing (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Credential_stuffing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Credential_stuffing)?
- 14 3y agoI have always felt the same. For me it is easy enough to have a little password book with everything written down. People often say what happens if there is a fire. I don’t have an answer to that but I have made it over 4 decades and not once had a fire so I’m going to believe the odds are I will not ever have a fire and chance it. Most things are recoverable with my phone number these days anyways. A much greater risk would be someone gaining access to my phone
- dotancohen 3y agoIf you have a fire, you'll just do what my wife does with _every_ password field she needs to use. You'll press the "forgot password" button. God help her if she needs to log into her email after I'm dead.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- StrangeATractor 3y agoI think Bruce Schneider recommended that most people should just keep their password in their wallet.
- jayknight 3y agoSource: https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2005/06/write_down_your.html https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2005/06/write_down_yo... But he also wrote his own password manager: https://www.schneier.com/academic/passsafe/ https://www.schneier.com/academic/passsafe/
- mtlynch 3y agoI didn't find it so scary due to the fact that it requires the attacker to read process memory. But then they pointed out that if the process memory gets paged to disk, then an attacker can recover the password from disk, which is admittedly scarier. Still, it does require the attacker to either have root on your machine or physical access to your disk. If the attacker has root on your machine, it's game over anyway. You can mitigate the threat of recovering the password from your disk by using disk encryption. Even when I hear about KeePass vulnerabilities, they're always substantially less severe than the attacks we see on LastPass and other web-hosted password managers where an attacker can exfiltrate bulk credentials at once by compromising a server.
- somat 3y agoOpenbsd encrypts it's swap by default, you can jump through a couple of hoops and encrypt your swap on linux. on windows, i don't know, however, if you have an encrypted disk your pagefile(if on that encrypted disk) will also be encrypted.
- dist-epoch 3y agoOn Windows the swap FILE is encrypted if the partition is stored into is encrypted. Same with the hibernation file, Bitlocker will require your password again (if it has one) on resume.
- somat 3y agoI went on a sort of deep dive of how swap partitions are encrypted. Most of the time the crypto block device is tied into the swap system, which makes a lot of sense, reusing layers and all that, That is how linux and freebsd do it. but openbsd is interesting. it uses 512KB blocks each with it's own encryption key, and once all references to a block are gone the key is discarded. so no guarantee but openbsd does try to lose anything that was put in swap as soon as possible. https://man.openbsd.org/sysctl.2#VM_SWAPENCRYPT~2 https://man.openbsd.org/sysctl.2#VM_SWAPENCRYPT~2
- XorNot 3y agoThis is hardly scary at all to me because if you're on my machine it's most likely game over. If you can read process memory you can just sit there until I use an interesting password copied into the clipboard. This is also the reason you always use full disk encryption: because you don't know what sensitive content might get sprayed into your files.
- el_hacker 3y agoMy password is a combination of creating a complex password and forgetting it + the 'Forgot password' button, Is anyone on the same ship?
- waboremo 3y agoCongratulations you're using Magic Links.
- smcleod 3y agoMods: the title should be changed to make it clear it's the KeePass app for Windows, not the KeePass vault format as used by many applications. It is not an exploit Keypass which is the encrypted vault used by many applications - but a single client.
- dist-epoch 3y agoThe actual vulnerability: > KeePass 2.X uses a custom-developed text box for password entry, SecureTextBoxEx. This text box is not only used for the master password entry, but in other places in KeePass as well, like password edit boxes (so the attack can also be used to recover their contents). > The flaw exploited here is that for every character typed, a leftover string is created in memory. Because of how .NET works, it is nearly impossible to get rid of it once it gets created. For example, when "Password" is typed, it will result in these leftover strings: •a, ••s, •••s, ••••w, •••••o, ••••••r, •••••••d. The POC application searches the dump for these patterns and offers a likely password character for each position in the password. https://github.com/vdohney/keepass-password-dumper https://github.com/vdohney/keepass-password-dumper
- ThunderSizzle 3y agoWell, yes. This is a known vulnerability of SecureString, and there is no true work around that I'm aware of. At some point, the string will be in memory, and this is why securestring isn't a recommended solution as much
- gnabgib 3y agoThe source is https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/keepass-exploit-helps-retrieve-cleartext-master-password-fix-coming-soon/ https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/keepass-explo... (as referenced in the article). It goes into more technical detail, and skips the antivirus sales pitch.
- icecap12 3y agoFirst significant vuln for KeePass in awhile. Still a better threat model than cloud.
- throw101010 3y agoIsn't it a bit unusual to release the details of an exploit before a fix is released? The author of the software seems to be cooperating to release a fix, I would think making it public would help people who would exploit this maliciously.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- j16sdiz 3y agoWould it? It need admin access to dump process memory. Those can do that are doing it already.
- Groxx 3y agoVulnerable vs not list, to make it more prominent: >All existing versions of KeePass 2.x (e.g., 2.53.1) are affected. Meanwhile, KeePass 1.x (an older edition of the program that’s still being maintained), KeePassXC, and Strongbox, which are other password managers compatible with KeePass database files, are not affected according to vdohney.
- jiggawatts 3y agoWindows has protected memory APIs to protect against precisely this kind of vulnerability. A simple method is to mark the "secure string storage" area as locked in memory, and hence not eligible for paging to disk.
- digitalsin 3y agoI'm a little surprised the article doesn't mention using a key file in conjunction with a password as an added security measure.
- lostmsu 3y agoThis is not a vulnerability because once you have the same privileges as the user, the game is over.
- _nalply 3y agoPerhaps it is possible to avoid having the plaintext in memory at all? - Only compare the crypttexts, never the plaintexts - For input use a modified input field to minimize the time the plaintext kept in memory then wipe the memory used by the input field before releasing the memory - If possible ask the OS never to swap the memory used by the input field