How to use password managers for mobile - #AskJeffTech

PasswordBox interface(Photo: PasswordBox)

LOS ANGELES — Last week we spoke about using password manager apps to keep track of the ever-growing list of passwords and user names for favorite websites.

Free tools like Dashlane, PasswordBox and LastPass work great when used on a computer. But we heard from readers with follow-up questions about using them elsewhere.

Gary, for instance, on Facebook, comments: "Much harder on mobile than desktop."

Considerably. For instance:

— Will Dashlane open the lock screen on my iPhone? (No.)

— Does PasswordBox throw the iTunes password in there for me when I pick up new apps? (Wouldn't that be nice?)

— Can any of the password managers key in my password for websites I visit via Safari, like Facebook or Dropbox? (Most won't, but PasswordBox will. On Android phones, it's not as cut and dried: You can do way more with password managers.)

So let's take a closer look, using, as examples, Dashlane and PasswordBox, two heavily downloaded apps.

Both apps have free versions. Dashlane charges $29.99 yearly for mobile access, while PasswordBox charges $12 yearly if you access more than 25 passwords.

The challenge for Dashlane is using it to create impossible-to-remember passwords, and then trying to open those sites on Safari, the Web browser for the iPhone and iPad.

Instead, think of Dashlane as a vault, a place to store those hard-to-remember combinations of letters, numbers and symbols that were created within the manager.

Open the app on the iPhone or iPad, and from there you can copy the password by clicking a tab, and then pasting into a website for sign-in.

Or, if you prefer signing in without copying and pasting, you can use the built-in browser — both Dashlane and PasswordBox have them — to bypass Safari. This is the workaround to open up sites and have sign-in credentials entered automatically.

It's also a workaround for e-commerce. One of the benefits of Dashlane (a feature you can't currently do with PasswordBox) is storing your credit card info — including the card number, expiration date and CVC code, along with address book info. When you want to buy, you just click one button for the transaction.

But you won't be able to do this in Safari. You'll need to use Dashlane's browser on sites like Amazon, eBay and the like.

On Android, it's a different story.

You still can't use the manager to unlock the lock screen — although PasswordBox says it's working on a solution with Samsung for the new Galaxy S5 to make this happen.

On most Android phones, like on PCs, the managers interact directly with Google's Chrome browser, making the add-on browser tool or vault status unnecessary.

So, if you have an Android phone, you're going to find the password manager experience to almost mirror that of the computer. And if you prefer the iPhone or iPad, either learn to use few passwords to make use of PasswordBox's iPhone 25 password limit for mobile log-on, pay the subscription, or stick with and pay for Dashlane's mobile access, and get used to copying and pasting those passwords within the built-in app browser.

Folks, keep the questions coming in. Look for me on Facebook,^[1] or on Twitter,^[2] where I'm @JeffersonGraham, and use the hastag #AskJeffTech so we can find you.

References

1. ^{^} https://www.facebook.com/jefferson.graham (www.facebook.com)
2. ^{^} http://twitter.com/jeffersongraham (twitter.com)