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Hit 30 days without a password manager and I'm not going back | Cybersecurity Tips - Chatter Central

Hit 30 days without a password manager and I'm not going back

Everyone in this sub seems to swear by password managers, but I dropped mine a month ago after a scare with a breach notification. I went old school with a physical notebook and two-factor auth on every account that supports it. So far, 30 days in and zero issues, plus I actually remember my logins now because I type them manually. The manager was a single point of failure I didn't want, especially after reading about a vault attack last year. My bank in Austin even flagged my new login method as normal after a week. I'm not saying managers are trash for everyone, but the complacency they create is real. Has anyone else ditched the manager and survived longer than a month without regret?

2 comments

2 Comments

jesse_green552mo ago

The "seatbelt" comparison is a good one, and I actually read a piece last year about how the real risk with password managers isn't the vaults getting hacked, but people reusing the same master password everywhere. That's the thing nobody wants to talk about. Your notebook idea works until a house guest snaps a photo or you drop it at the coffee shop. I've also seen stories where people lost the notebook in a move and it took them weeks to reset every account, which sounds way worse than a locked vault. Not saying you're wrong for you, but a month is a real short test drive for something you're betting your whole login life on.

sethhernandez2mo ago

So you ditched a tool because of one breach scare and now you're writing a victory post after a whole month? That's like bragging you survived a week without a seatbelt. The vault attack you read about probably affected a tiny fraction of users and most of them got their accounts locked, not drained. Meanwhile you're typing passwords into a notebook that can get lost, stolen, or burned in a fire and then where are you? Two-factor is good but it doesn't help when someone's already got the password written on a sticky note at their desk. You said the manager made you complacent, but honestly writing down every login and remembering them all sounds like way more work for zero real security gain.