[Discuss] Password managers

[dbarrett at blazemonger.com (Daniel Barrett)]

Steve Litt writes:
>Daniel Barrett <dbarrett at blazemonger.com> wrote:
>> 3. Retrieve passwords using a simple script that calls gpg to decrypt,
>> grep to find the line you want, and cut to isolate the username &
>> password. Optionally, call xclip to copy username & password into the
>> window manager's clipboard for easy pasting.
>
>About #3: Every password you use is on your clipboard, available to
>anyone who grabs a terminal. Clipboard contents survive the opening and
>closing of terminals, and I think there are utilities to view your
>entire paste buffer.

Thanks so much, Steve. I believe this issue is not hard to mitigate. I
have cultivated a habit of overwriting the clipboard immediately after
pasting the password. To do this, I just double-click on any text in
any terminal window.

Another solution could be for the script to launch a background process
to clear the clipboard after (say) 30 seconds, e.g.:

  sleep 30 && (echo | xclip) &

As for utilities to view the paste buffer, I *think* you mean there
are clipboard managers that store all clipboard entries in a list for
convenient retrieval, such as Klipper. You're right; that's a
danger. I make sure none of these clipboard managers are running.

Cheers,
Dan