#common passwords

[wiki-fight]

[ghostzzy]

oh here’s a poll i don’t think i’ve ever seen before:

[antisociallilbrat]

Bill world-famous-renowned-bestselling-author Denbrough does not run his social media sites. He doesn't even know the passwords to them. One time in the beginning he posted some weird shit and/or accidently posted to his public story something about Bev pegging him and his social media rights got yanked away so fast. His team runs them. He's not allowed to have them.

Same thing with Richie. His team runs his social media accounts bc he couldn't stop posting shit like 'Rating my Lovers one to ten on their noodle slurping ability' and yes he actually meant noodle slurping. Didn't matter- banned from his own accounts.

He makes a fake fan page for himself so it's okay. It's pretty popular too and his fans have no idea it's him.

[every-character-ever-poll]

Oh.

Hello.

Well then. Did I say anything for 1,000 followers? I really can't remember, but nonetheless, thank you all for your continued support of this fun project of mine! Should I do something for this milestone? I honestly don't have any ideas, but if you all think of a fun gimmick to do I'd be happy to.

Once again, thank you for enjoying this blog, even if you tossed a follow months ago and forgot I existed when I vanished (again), I really do appreciate all the support and engagement I've been getting, and I do plan on continuing this blog for quite a while! At the very least, I want to get to a point where I have completed all the submissions, be that within another year or another ten.

[da-riya]

local password mamagers are a thing that do exist btw, can personally reccomend KeePassXC, but its not like Ive used others

Fair I could've imagined there's always a better way of doing things then having one password and if it doesn't fit making a variation of it

[keyboardfantasies]

can't have shit these days

[microwavepopcorn]

[plslemmedie]

I legitimately forgot I had this account, and was extremely confused when I tried to make a new tumbler account with the same email

[pinkhairandpronounsboy]

They say violence is not the answer.

They’re right. Murder is.

[glagger-true]

🐺🐗

devotion that corrupts is my favorite btw there's nothing wrong with it ever & it should be encouraged

[gender-euphowrya]

blue prince is gonna make me set up a conspiracy theory corkboard with red string wall

[dancerinthesky]

Drilling canon Harry Potter content into my head so that I can stay sane and sensible at my graveyard shifts in the Marauders fandom.

Warning: the tags got genuinely stupid im sorry i'm so sleepy

[plainlyraine]

guys I did the thing

[chromegnomes]

the most frustrating thing about AI Art from a Discourse perspective is that the actual violation involved is pretty nebulous

like, the guys "laundering" specific artists' styles through AI models to mimic them for profit know exactly what they're doing, and it's extremely gross

but we cannot establish "my work was scraped from the public internet and used as part of a dataset for teaching a program what a painting of a tree looks like, without anyone asking or paying me" as, legally, Theft with a capital T. not only is this DMCA Logic which would be a nightmare for 99% of artists if enforced to its conclusion, it's not the right word for what's happening

the actual Violation here is that previously, "I can post my artwork to share with others for free, with minimal risk" was a safe assumption, which created a pretty generous culture of sharing artwork online. most (noteworthy) potential abuses of this digital commons were straightforwardly plagiarism in a way anyone could understand

but the way that generative AI uses its training data is significantly more complicated - there is a clear violation of trust involved, and often malicious intent, but most of the common arguments used to describe this fall short and end up in worse territory

by which I mean, it's hard to put forward an actual moral/legal solution unless you're willing to argue:

Potential sales "lost" count as Theft (so you should in fact stop sharing your Netflix password)

No amount of alteration makes it acceptable to use someone else's art in the production of other art without permission and/or compensation (this would kill entire artistic mediums and benefit nobody but Disney)

Art Styles should be considered Intellectual Property in an enforceable way (impossibly bad, are you kidding me)

it's extremely annoying to talk about, because you'll see people straight up gloating about their Intent To Plagiarize, but it's hard to stick them with any specific crime beyond Generally Scummy Behavior unless you want to create some truly horrible precedents and usher in The Thousand Year Reign of Intellectual Property Law

[sharlsworld]

⋆⭒˚.⋆ my best friends brother - 𝐂𝐋𝟏𝟔 ✴︎

（ 𝗉𝖺𝗂𝗋𝗂𝗇𝗀 ）𝖼𝗁𝖺𝗋𝗅𝖾𝗌 𝗅𝖾𝖼𝗅𝖾𝗋𝖼 𝗑 𝖺𝗋𝗍𝗁𝗎𝗋𝗌 𝖻𝖾𝗌𝗍 𝖿𝗋𝗂𝖾𝗇𝖽 𝗋𝖾𝖺𝖽𝖾𝗋

（ 𝗌𝗎𝗆𝗆𝖺𝗋𝗒 ）𝖺𝗋𝗍𝗁𝗎𝗋𝗌 𝖼𝗁𝗂𝗅𝖽𝗁𝗈𝗈𝖽 𝖻𝖾𝗌𝗍 𝖿𝗋𝗂𝖾𝗇𝖽 𝗁𝖺𝗌 𝗁𝖺𝖽 𝗍𝗁𝖾 𝗌𝗐𝖾𝖾𝗍𝖾𝗌𝗍 𝗅𝗂𝗍𝗍𝗅𝖾 𝖼𝗋𝗎𝗌𝗁 𝗈𝗇 𝖼𝗁𝖺𝗋𝗅𝖾𝗌 𝗌𝗂𝗇𝖼𝖾 𝗌𝗁𝖾 𝗐𝖺𝗌 𝗅𝗂𝗍𝗍𝗅𝖾 𝖺𝗇𝖽 𝗇𝗈𝗐 𝗍𝗁𝖺𝗍 𝗌𝗁𝖾𝗌 𝖺𝗅𝗅 𝗀𝗋𝗈𝗐𝗇 𝗎𝗉 𝗁𝖾𝗌 𝗌𝗍𝖺𝗋𝗍𝗂𝗇𝗀 𝗍𝗈 𝗀𝖾𝗍 𝗍𝗁𝗂𝗌 𝗐𝖾𝗂𝗋𝖽 𝖿𝖾𝖾𝗅𝗂𝗇𝗀 𝗂𝗇 𝗁𝗂𝗌 𝗌𝗍𝗈𝗆𝖺𝖼𝗁 𝗐𝗁𝖾𝗇𝖾𝗏𝖾𝗋 𝗁𝖾 𝗌𝖾𝖾𝗌 𝗁𝖾𝗋

✫ i imagined her to be 22 idk sorry i love a good age gap also my first charles smau!!

🝮

yn

liked by pierregasly and 1,175,903 others

yn “let’s go for a ride on the boat it’ll be fun”

charles_leclerc Did you or did you not have fun?

⤷ yn you almost flung me off the boat when you had to swerve out of the way of the rock

⤷ charles_leclerc And I apologized for making you bite your tongue on accident bug can we please move past that?

⤷ yn you broke my hairbrush trying to detangle my hair

⤷ charles_leclerc And I ordered you a new hairbrush bug can we please move past that as well?

⤷ sharls_lerklerk charles calling her bug is something very dear to me

arthur_leclerc “It’s not gonna be like last time guys I’ve learned from my mistakes”

⤷ jade_dishtinguinn poor arthur got water boarded for the second this month 😭

⤷ user1634445581 i would never let my bf have a girl best friend

⤷ yn I literally introduced them??

lorenzotl Charles trying to recreate the titanic

⤷ yn always needs the attention on him 🙄 (i’ll give him attention)

♥︎ by charles_leclerc

estiebestie charles finally acknowledging y/n’s crush on him will always be my favorite thing

charles_leclerc Face card never declines

⤷ yn omg u slut 🙂‍↕️

forzacharles why is charles trying to recreate the jack and rose scene with y/n??

⤷ yn my exact thoughts like we just gon keep playing eye tag or you gonna holla at ur boy? 😤

⤷ arthur_leclerc dis gur

alex_albon wait your like kinda giving mermaid turned human vibes??

⤷ lilymhe no I see your vision

lando the money i would pay to see that boat ride

⤷ charles_leclerc You wanna go for a boat ride??? 😄 No one wants to go with me anymore…not even y/n it’s lowkey making me depressed

⤷ lando um no i kinda hope to live to see my next birthday or whatever

⤷ yn you’re such a copy cat you wanna be different so bad but you’ll never be different

⤷ lando ???

⤷ yn don’t ??? me fattie you know you hella wrong for what you did

🝮

charles_leclerc

liked by lewishamilton and 3,972,124 others

charles_leclerc I am hopelessly in love

arthur_leclerc am I tweaking

leclerc_pascale We know son ❤️

francisca.cgomes i thought you were gay for max and carlos? like aren’t you guys a throuple or something

⤷ charles_leclerc that’s common knowledge i fear

charles_leclerc NONONO I TOOK A NAP AND SHE TOOK MY PHONE

⤷ yn HAHAHAHAH

⤷ arthur_leclerc Did you send charles this picture so you could post it 😭

⤷ yn no he already had it in his camera roll

⤷ lordperceval 😦?? i need to see more

charles_leclerc IT WASNT ME GUYS I DIDNT POST THIS

charles_leclerc I AM NOT IN A THROUPLE WITH CARLOS OR MAX GUYS PLEASE BELIEVE ME

danielricciardo Damn bro that is a beautiful picture it really captures her essence

maxverstappen1 Why don’t you capture my damn essence like this?

lorenzotl How did she even get into your phone?

⤷ charles_leclerc She deleted my face from it in like 2021 and added hers

⤷ lorenzotl Why didn’t you delete it?

⤷ charles_leclerc I don’t know how

⤷ lorenzotl Why didn’t you look it up?

⤷ charles_leclerc This conversation is over

⤷ arthur_leclerc So you’ve been manually typing in your password for 4 years cause you don’t wanna delete her Face ID from your phone?

⤷ charles_leclerc This conversation is over

francolapinto raw, next question

⤷ yn 😨😰😥😏

⤷ charles_leclerc No

arthur_leclerc Guys I think I swallowed to much ocean water my stomach hurts

⤷ oscarpiastri google said you have 3 days idk

🝮

yn

liked by charles_leclerc and 1,213,856 others

yn scheming how to make my best friends brother fall madly in love with me

francisca.cgomes y/n searching up “love spells” on tik tok

arthur_leclerc y/n is probably doing some weird dance around a bunch of candles in the shape of a heart with charles leclerc edits playing on her tv and ipad rn

⤷ yn are you fucking watching me through my windows or something damn

charlotte2304 She just ordered a bag of rose quartz guys

hoeforsainzzz charles wants her so bad he’s just trying to play hard to get fr

⤷ yn bro wants to play the long game 🙂‍↕️

♥︎ by charles_leclerc

lecult_4lyfe y/n is the most loyal person ever

alex_albon Omg let me help I’ll show you stuff I did to get lily to date me

⤷ lilymhe ???

⤷ alex_albon Girl I’m a mastermind

sharls.eclair we know she ain’t lying either

oscarpiastri I wish I knew all the lore on this crush

⤷ georgerussell63 Omg I’ll make a PowerPoint

⤷ lando great you’ve brought out powerpoint george thanks a lot oscar. thanks a lot.

🝮

charles_leclerc

liked by carlossainz55 and 2,621,904 others

charles_leclerc training camp, part 2. 😘

yn no lube, no protection, all night, all day, from the kitchen floor to the toilet seat, from the dining table to the bedroom, from the bathroom sink to the shower, from the front porch to the balcony, vertically, horizontally, quadratic, exponential, logarithmic, while I gasp for air, scream and see the light, missionary, cowgirl, reverse cowgirl, doggy, backwards, sideways, upside down, on the floor, on the bed, on the couch, on a chair, being held against the wall, outside, in a train, on a plane, in the car, on a motorcycle, the the bed of a truck, on a trampoline, in a bounce house, in the pool, bent over, in the basement, against the window, have the most toe curling, back arching, leg shaking, dick throbbing, fist clenching, ear ringing, mouth drooling, ass clenching, nose sniffling, eye watering, eye rolling, hip thrusting, earthquaking, sheet gripping, knuckles cracking, jaw dropping, hair pulling, teeth jitterbug, mind boggling, soul snatching, overstimulating, vile, sloppy, moan inducing, heart wrenching, spine tingling, back breaking, atrocious, gushy, creamy, beastly, lip biting, gravity defying, nail biting, sweaty, feet kicking, mind blowing, body shivering, orgasmic, bone breaking, world ending, black hole creating, universe destroying, devious, scrumptious, amazing, delightful, delectable, unbelievable, body numbing, bark worthy, can't walk, head nodding, soul evaporating, volcano erupting, sweat rolling, voice cracking, trembling, sheets soaked, hair drenched, flabbergasting, lip locking, skin peeling, eyelash removing, eye widening, pussy popping, nail scratching, back cuts, spectacular, brain cell desolving, hair ripping, show stopping, magnificent, unique, extraordinary, slendid, phenomenal, mouth foaming, heavenly, awakening, devils tango ever bro could cause a nuclear bomb inside me and I'd still ride.

⤷ charles_leclerc i meannn….

⤷ yn you want me so bad

⤷ charles_leclerc i meannnnnn……

⤷ yn OMG HE WANTS ME SO BAD GUYS

arthur_leclerc I can’t believe i just read that

maxverstappen1 Oh my fuck I feel like I just got assaulted or something

lando i need to bathe myself in bleach

lewishamilton Wow that was freaky even for me

oscarpiastri I’m gonna call my mom and tell her I love her

🝮

yn

liked by lando and 2,237,713 others

yn guess who

charles_leclerc Wait

charles_leclerc What the fuck

charles_leclerc Are you serious

charles_leclerc Is this real

charles_leclerc Did you get hacked?

charles_leclerc Who is that

charles_leclerc Bug who is that

charles_leclerc Please stop bug

charles_leclerc Is this is a joke?

charles_leclerc STOP IS THIS REAL ARE YOU SERIOUS IS THIS AN ACTUAL DATE???????

charles_leclerc SOMEBODY ANSWER ME PLEASE

charles_leclerc WHY ARE YOU CHEATING ON ME

charles_leclerc BUG PLEASE I THOUGHT WE WERE GONNA GET MARRIED PLEASE

charles_leclerc I KNOW IVE PLAYED HARD TO GET BUT I’VE LIKED YOU SINCE YOU WERE LIKE 18 AND I KNOW THATS WEIRD CAUSE I WAS 24 BUT I COULDNT HELP IT YOU CANT FIGHT LOVE

charles_leclerc BUG PLEASE IVE LITERALLY HAD YOUR ENGAGEMENT RING HIDDEN IN MY FUCKING SOCK DRAWER FOR A YEAR PLEASE

charles_leclerc PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE YOU WERE ALWAYS GONNA BE MY WIFE

charles_leclerc AH FUCK IM GONNA DIE ALONE

charles_leclerc oh my gosh i missed my chance didn’t i?

charles_leclerc i waited to long

charles_leclerc Didn’t even get to hit that

⤷ arthur_leclerc Oh my gosh charles you sicko you’re a fuckin perv 😂😂🫵🏽

⤷ charles_leclerc shut up arthur now’s not the time

charles_leclerc Who is it I’ll kill him

charles_leclerc It’s the haircut isn’t it??? I told maman she cut it to short

charles_leclerc OHHH MY SHAYLA

charles_leclerc please bug i was gonna marry you i swear so bad i literally had it all planned out

charles_leclerc YOURE MY END AND MY BEGINNING EVEN WHEN I LOSE IM WINNING CAUSE I GIVE YOU AALLLLLLLL OF ME TO YOU

charles_leclerc I always thought Ferrari would be the reason I ended myself but it’s this

⤷ yn nooo don’t kill yourself your so sexy aha

⤷ charles_leclerc OH SO NOW YOU GOT JOKES? ARE YOU OR ARE YOU NOT CHEATING ON ME WITH SOME UGLY ASS SKANK?

⤷ lando who tf are you calling a ugly ass skank?

⤷ charles_leclerc YOU WENT A DATE WITH LANDO FUCKING NORRIS???

⤷ lando girl there ain’t no one in the world that can resist this fine ass honey mhmmmm

⤷ charles_leclerc ok gay ass go kiss on carlos or something fucking slut

⤷ yn oh my gosh charles i’ve never seen this side of you 🙂‍↕️

⤷ charles_leclerc are you or are you not cheating on me with lando fucking norris?

⤷ yn daddy chill

⤷ yn it was all apart of my plan you made it to easy

⤷ yn i’ve never seen you cuss so much

lando we just seen charles leclerc crashing out over his little brothers best friend guys this is a historical moment for us chayn shippers

⤷ arthur_leclerc This is gonna be taught in history classes in the future bro trust

charles_leclerc What the fuck I was just manipulated into confessing my crush on my little brothers best friend to the entire world

alex_albon chayn shippers rise

⤷ lando risen ☝️

⤷ georgerussell63 risen ☝️

⤷ danielricciardo risen ☝️

⤷ liamlawson30 risen ☝️

⤷ charles_leclerc This is exactly who I thought would be apart this club fucking losers

⤷ lando this is how you treat loyal fans? i’m not showing the edits we made now

⤷ charles_leclerc Show it to me pleaseeee send it to me Rachel 😔

⤷ lando why is charles leclerc lowkey turning into a pathetic little bitch boy?

⤷ charles_leclerc What the fuck did I do to you?

⤷ lando you called me a fucking ugly ass skank

⤷ charles_leclerc bruh it was a joke it was just in the heat of the moment

⤷ lando i don’t want to hear your excuses 🙄🤚

🝮

yn

liked by zendaya and 3,916,447 others

yn i’m a mastermind

francolapinto tears in my latina eyes

⤷ francolapinto oh shit wait

arthur_leclerc my favorite panther

⤷ yn 🐆🐆 (i know it’s a cheetah shut up)

francisca.cgomes i know that’s right

lilymhe I’m proud, truly

carlossainz55 Peter…how are you doing that

leclerc_pascale My prayers have been answered

pierregasly Great get married now

⤷ yn let’s have a double wedding

⤷ francisca.cgomes omg lets do it

charles_leclerc bugs school of manifestation

⤷ yn a masterclass

♥︎ by charles_leclerc

danielricciardo This is in fact a love story

alex_albon younger me is probably so shook rn

⤷ lando 21 year old me is flabbergasted rn

maxverstappen1 Damn what spells are you using

⤷ yn you’ll never know 🤫🤫

lorenzotl I’ve never seen him look so free

⤷ yn this was kinda poetic lowk

oscarpiastri I can see the future

carlossainz55 Dreams do come true ig

lewishamilton damn girl teach me your ways

sharls_lerklerk what’s 4 + 4??

estiebestie i need to know what that damn dance looked liked cause wtf

🝮

charles_leclerc

liked by tomholland2013 and 4,455,813 others

charles_leclerc she bamboozled me

yn omg you want me so bad

⤷ charles_leclerc I do want you so bad

⤷ yn my pants were JUST on i swear

♥︎ by charles_leclerc

yn 7 year old me is bouncing off walls rn

♥︎ by charles_leclerc

lando you’re welcome i was part of that plan

⤷ charles_leclerc ugly ass skank

arthur_leclerc seriously just get married you already admitted to having the ring

⤷ charles_leclerc Yeah I can’t believe I just told the whole world that

⤷ lando cause you were being pathetic you bitch

⤷ georgerussell63 Omg loving this beef let’s keep this energy in the new season ❤️

⤷ f1 Let’s not ❤️

alex_albon Cute or whateva

carlossainz55 This calls for celebration! Let’s party like there’s no tomorrow

⤷ yn damn how are things at williams?

⤷ alex_albon excuse me i’ll have you know that he was chugging down coffee and munching on all the food did they not feed him at ferrari?

⤷ f1 Let’s not ❤️

alex_albon So as president of chayn club I will be accepting a check for my undying support over the years

⤷ georgerussell63 and i as vice president

⤷ lando and i as the founder

⤷ danielricciardo and i as secretary

⤷ liamlawson30 and i as treasurer

⤷ charles_leclerc I hope your hungry…for nothing

⤷ lando girl you thought you ate that 😒 i want our checks by the end of the week or i’m never sending you our edits

⤷ charles_leclerc be expecting mail in the next few days ❤️

[ms-demeanor]

I've seen you say a few times that it's a good idea to have a password manager; could you explain why? I always feel like I'm missing something when it's mentioned because it's phrased as if there's an obvious danger that password managers protect you from, but I'm honestly not sure how they help keep passwords secure.

The obvious danger is human nature. Humans are bad at creating passwords; your passwords are almost certainly easy to guess, repeated across different accounts, or both, because that is just how the vast VAST majority of people create passwords, because humans are bad at creating passwords. Everybody knows "the rules" for creating passwords (don't use the same password on multiple websites, don't include personal details in your passwords, don't use very common words or letter or number sequences in your passwords, don't tell other people your password) and people break all of those rules anyway.

A standalone (not in-browser like firefox or chrome password manager, though those are better than nothing) password manager stores your passwords, generates complex passwords for you, and can also be used for things like storing notes on passwords (like "did I put my MFA on my email or my cellphone or an app for this password?" or "here are the made-up answers to the security questions I used for this website because I definitely didn't use real answers or answers I'd used on previous websites" or "these are the bills associated with this credit card").

With the way the current security landscape works, there are two things that are extremely important when you are creating a password:

Uniqueness

Complexity

The overwhelmingly prevalent way that people get "hacked" these days is through credential stuffing.

Let's say that your private data was revealed in the Experian breach a decade ago. It revealed your name, email address, and phone number. Now let's also say that your private data was revealed in one of the many breaches from social media sites; that one revealed your name, email address, phone number, password, and security questions.

If someone wants to try to gain access to one of your accounts - let's say your bank account - if they have your name and phone number (usually extremely easy to find online), they can cross-reference that information with data that has been revealed in previous breaches - now they've got your name and your email address (which you probably used to sign up for your online banking and have ABSOLUTELY used as your login for accounts all over the place) and at least one password that you've used somewhere.

But the thing is, they don't have one password. They have every password associated with that email address that has ever been revealed in a breach. If you go to the site haveibeenpwned.com you can enter your email and see how many times your email address has appeared in a breach. You can compare that with the number of passwords that were revealed in those breaches and you can ask yourself "what did those passwords have in common?"

Because I can tell you, my Tumblr password from 2013, my Kickstarter password from 2014, and my Disqus password from 2017 (all revealed in various breaches) probably had a lot in common.

So, now the hacker has: your name, your email (which is probably your username), and various passwords they can try to use to log in. Did you use the same password for Facebook and Twitter eight years ago? Did you use parts of that password for creating your bank password? If you heard that twitter passwords were exposed in a breach you probably changed that password, but did you change the bank password that you built on the same structure? Probably not.

So what people will do is gather up all of this information and guess. They'll try your 2017 Disqus password to see if it will get access to your bank account. They'll try your 2020 Gravatar password. They'll try your 2024 Internet Archive Password.

And the reason they do this is because it works.

And the reason that it works is because we are all fucking garbage at remembering unique, complex passwords so instead of creating actually unique, complex passwords most people pick one memorable word or phrase, one memorable number, one unusual character, and *MAYBE* one feature of the site they're creating the login for and they use that template forever (1988Tumblrmacabre!, 1988Facebookmacabre!, 1988Ticketmastermacabre!) OR they create one password that they think is complex enough and use it across multiple sites with minor tweaks ($n0h0mi$hRu13z, sn0h0mishRul13z!, $n0h0mi$hWA) as needed for the sites' password requirements.

So most of what password managers do that is a drastic security improvement over people creating and memorizing passwords is that they create passwords that are functionally impossible to guess and functionally impossible to memorize. The problem with memorizing passwords (which is what you're doing if you're creating a bunch of passwords that you type in all the time) is that you can't actually remember all that many passwords so you'll repeat those passwords. The problem with creating passwords on your own is that passwords that humans create are pretty guessable. Even if you're doing a passphrase that's a long string of words you're probably working with common words ("correct horse battery staple" as opposed to "truculent zygote onomatopoeia frangible") and your password is more guessable than you'd really want it to be. Password managers don't do that, they generate gibberish.

Perhaps you are that rare person who gets out a set of dice and a notepad and rolls up every character for your password and memorizes it and never repeats, and if that's you, you could still benefit from a password manager because a password manager makes it easier to change that unique complex password when it is inevitably revealed in a breach.

So, okay, let's check in with where we're at:

Password managers mean that you don't have to memorize your password, which means that you don't need a password that is easy to memorize, which means that they can create passwords that are extremely complex and are therefore very difficult to guess. This protects you from crackers who will try to brute force your password.

Password managers mean that you don't have to remember extremely complex passwords for every account, which means that you are less likely to repeat your password in whole or in part across multiple accounts. This protects you from credential stuffers, who will try to use your password from one account that was revealed in a breach to open other accounts that were not.

Because password managers can generate and store complex passwords essentially instantly, you can replace passwords nearly effortlessly when there is a breach (no need to 'come up with' a new password, no issues with learning or memorizing it).

There are, however, advantages beyond that.

One major, MAJOR advantage of a properly-used standalone password manager is that it makes you safer from various kinds of phishing attempts and link hijacking. When you are setting up a password in your password manager (PWM from here on), you should be on the website that you want to log in to. The PWM will give you the option to save the domain that you're logging in to. That means the PWM will remember the correct URL for your Tumblr login so when you go to the tumblr login screen in the future, it will offer to fill those fields. What it will NOT do is offer to fill those fields if someone sends you an email that spoofs tumblr support and wants you to log in at "tumblr.co" or "tumblr-support.com." Knowing this, and knowing that you should be putting your credentials in through the PWM fill option rather than copy/paste, is a GREAT way to protect against phishing that is often overlooked and definitely under-discussed.

Another advantage is that a standalone PWM will let you store secure notes with your passwords so that you can do things like keep track of recovery codes for the website, or generate gibberish answers to security questions. Security questions and answers are often revealed in breaches, can't be reset by the user as easily as a password, are repeated across websites MUCH more than passwords, and can be used to take over an account and reset the password. You shouldn't be giving real security answers, or even fake-but-repeated security answers; you should treat each of those like a password that needs to be complex and unique, which means that they need to be stored someplace (like a password manager).

I also personally use my password manager to store my car insurance information, my driver's license info, and payment details for easy entry, making it convenient for a lot of thing beyond password storage. (Bitwarden. My password manager is bitwarden. I recommend Bitwarden. go to ms-demeanor.com and search "bitwarden" to learn more.)

As to how they keep your passwords safe, aside from ensuring that you don't enter your credentials into a skimming site, a good password manager is well encrypted. Your password safe should be functionally impossible to crack and what people tend to not realize is that a proper password manager (like bitwarden) doesn't keep all your passwords in one encrypted safe, each one of your passwords is in its own encrypted safe. If someone hacks Bitwarden it's not like using a huge amount of effort breaking into a bank vault and finding a big pile of money, it's like using a huge amount of effort breaking into a bank vault and finding a big pile of bank vaults. Each password within your vault requires decryption that is functionally impossible to crack (at least with a good password manager, like bitwarden, the password manager I recommend and think that people should use).

Additionally, just as, like, a side note: password managers never accidentally leave caps lock on or forget which characters are capital or lower case and don't require the use of two hands and focused attention on the keyboard. You're never going to mistype your password if the password manager is filling it, and you would not believe the number of people we support at work who require password resets because they are typing their password wrong and don't realize it.

TL;DR:

Password managers make better passwords than you can and they make it possible to instantly create, store, and enter complex passwords, which prevents password cracking and makes people less likely to reuse passwords. They are heavily encrypted and should be functionally impossible to access, and each individual password within the manager should also be encrypted if you use a good password manager. Password managers also prevent people from entering their credentials on scam sites by only filling on matched domains. Standalone password managers (not browser password managers) also allow users to create and store unique security questions and account details to prevent bad actors from gaining access with stolen security answers. The password manager I recommend is Bitwarden.

If people used password managers to create, store, and use unique and complex passwords, and if they did regular backups of their system I think that probably about half of the InfoSec field would be out of a job.

Please use a password manager!