Password managers are quite popular these days, and Dashlane is one of the most-used providers of that service on the web.
Well, the folks at Dashlane have just published a new blog post about a great sounding initiative they’ve developed called “Project Mirror: Kill the Password”.
I won’t go into the details of how Project Mirror will work because you can get all that info in their blog post should you choose to read it. But I will tell you that I don’t like it.
But in a nutshell, “Project Mirror” will instruct your Dashlane password manager to scan your emails and other various sources for info on all of your online accounts.
They will then use that information to determine which of your accounts are most vulnerable to hackers and automatically change your passwords to those accounts without your consent. (Well, that’s not entirely true since you give your consent by agreeing to their Terms of Service. You do read all the TOS pages you agree to, right?)
After all the passwords to the “vulnerable” accounts have been changed Dashlane will log you into your online accounts automatically. In other words, you won’t have to deal with passwords at all from that point forward. Dashlane will blissfully do it all for you!
I strongly recommend that you respectfully take a pass on using this “service”, for the following reasons:
1 – I think it’s unwise to hand over complete control of all of your online accounts to an online service that could itself be hacked or exploited by a rogue employee.
And trust me, password manager services are no more immune from those kinds of threats than any other online service or computer program.
Want real-world proof? Read this and this. And then of course there’s this.
Notice the dangers here?
2 – I think it’s best to maintain personal control over your passwords.
Why? Because if a hacker or anyone else manages to break into your password manager he/she will have immediate and total access to every online account you have, including your bank account(s) and other financial services.
I don’t know about you, but to me that’s a pretty scary thought.
Bottom line: I believe it’s wise to avoid using password manager apps of any kind, and that goes double for Dashlane and their new “Project Mirror: Kill the Password” initiative.
Wondering how to successfully manage your passwords without using a password manager? Here are a couple of tips:
1 – Create secure passwords that are easy to remember and keep a written record of them in a fireproof lock box.
2 – Enable Two-Factor Authentication on every online account that supports it.
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