Google Announces "Password Alert" To Protect Against Phishing Attacks

HughPickens.com writes: Google has announced Password Alert, a free, open-source Chrome extension that protects your Google Accounts from phishing attacks. Once you've installed it, Password Alert will show a warning if you type your Google password into a site that isn't a Google sign-in page. This protects you from phishing attacks and also encourages you to use different passwords for different sites, a security best practice. Once you've installed and initialized Password Alert, Chrome will remember a "scrambled" version of your Google Account password. It only remembers this information for security purposes and doesn't share it with anyone. If you type your password into a site that isn't a Google sign-in page, an alert will tell you that you're at risk of being phished so you can update your password and protect yourself.

Comments

Funny

[ArcadeMan]

Google warning us about other people trying to get our informations.

Re:Funny

[Chalnoth]

Google might show you ads that could entice you to buy something you might not otherwise buy.

Phishers might steal your account and, if you have Google Wallet attached, might use your account to spend money. Or they might use your e-mail to gain access to other accounts (e.g. bank accounts).

Re:Wait..

[Anonymous Coward]

Because telling you as you're typing your password into a phishing page is already too late. Javascript key logging anyone?

Chrome will remember a "scrambled" version

[SoCalChris]

It's sad how far Slashdot has fallen.

Re:Chrome will remember a "scrambled" version

[Anonymous Coward]

It's sad how smugly superior the tech nerds are here.

Re:Chrome will remember a "scrambled" version

[Okian Warrior]

It's sad how far Slashdot has fallen.

It's sad how smugly superior the tech nerds are here.

It's sad that non-tech people waste their time visiting a site advertising itself as "news for nerds" and then complain when someone wants the site to cater to nerds.

It's sad how entire families can be torn apart by something as simple as wild dogs.

Re:Chrome will remember a "scrambled" version

[thegarbz]

Yeah how dare they faithfully quote an article.

Re:Chrome will remember a "scrambled" version

[Em Adespoton]

...when they could have instead used a more succinct summary aimed at nerds, or, picked a different source document. I mean, this doesn't even tell us what hash algorithm is used to "scramble" our locally stored passphrase.

What I'd really like to see is a keychain helper (listening, Apple, onepass, etc?) that keylogs browser forms and performs this function against ANY password stored in the keychain. I mean, I've already got a keychain full of password/uri pairs -- why not do this with it as well?

The downside of course is that said helper would have to have full read access to the hashed keychain -- which while not a huge security issue, still could leak data like what uris you have stored in the keychain.

Re:Chrome will remember a "scrambled" version

[amias]

hmm , how do i find passwords on this computer...

lets start typing random strings into a password field until this plugin tells me which is the google password.

yay , now i can log in to their google account first time !

this is almost as silly as those things that validate your bank cards pin for online banking that let
muggers force you to disclose your pin in a way that the banking system couldn't possibly no.

i really hope this isn't going to be installed on mobile phones

Re:Chrome will remember a "scrambled" version

[gsslay]

It's quoting TFA.

I'm hoping that's just Google simplifying for the common end user and it is using some kind of encryption. But who knows?

Put on the popcorn

[vux984]

Put on the popcorn and wait for the fireworks show that arises when people who use the same password they use for google on other sites.

Still its an interesting idea, that might be usable in a general purpose extension that maintains hashes and URLs and then hashes every input box and compares it to the databse / urls -- and if it finds a hash match but the URL is wrong throw up an alert.

Way more useful than a google only one that only works in chrome and only when you are signed in.

Re:Put on the popcorn

[ShanghaiBill]

Put on the popcorn and wait for the fireworks show that arises when people who use the same password they use for google on other sites.

The intersection of the set of people that care about security enough to install this extension, yet don't care enough to use unique passwords, is probably rather small. When there is a problem, they could do the stupid thing and uninstall the extension, or they could do the smart thing, and start using unique passwords. Either way, there would be no need for fireworks.

Still its an interesting idea, that might be usable in a general purpose extension that maintains hashes and URLs and then hashes every input box and compares it to the databse / urls -- and if it finds a hash match but the URL is wrong throw up an alert.

Yes, making this work for all password protected sites, rather than Google-only, would be nice. That would not only stop many phishing attempts, but would also discourage cross-site password reuse.

Re:Put on the popcorn

[Bing Tsher E]

But it's none of Google's business what I use as a password on other sites. Not that I use Chrome except at work where it's required.

Re:Put on the popcorn

[ewibble]

people will still use the same password even with this tool, because they are lazy.

instead of "password" for all sites they will use password.google or something similar to bypass this and the passwords will still be fished

Re:Put on the popcorn

[vux984]

The intersection of the set of people that care about security enough to install this extension, yet don't care enough to use unique passwords, is probably rather small

Fair enough. Still...

"Password Alert is also available to Google for Work customers, including Google Apps and Drive for Work. Your administrator can install Password Alert for everyone in the domains they manage, and receive alerts when Password Alert detects a possible problem."

The intersection of administrators who might think its a good idea with end users that use the same password on other sites might be large enough to be at least a little bit fun.

Yes, making this work for all password protected sites, rather than Google-only, would be nice. That would not only stop many phishing attempts, but would also discourage cross-site password reuse.

Yeah, if it were integrated with something like password safe or password gorilla or keypass etc.

Or I suppose it could be tied into the A/V products which already have anti-phishing extensions -- McAfee for example, already has a password safe and antiphishing ... seems almost a no-brainer for them to integrate them in this way. The password safe component could dump a list of hashes and domain names and if you try entering a password that matches the hash throw up an alert. And then maybe flag the page for A/V's phishing lists so if a page is generating alerts like crazy visitors it can be blacklisted -- preventing other users from even reaching the domain/phishing page.

Re:Put on the popcorn

[vux984]

Your criticism amounts to "If it doesn't completely solve the problem for everybody its no good." and that is false.

Yes some will switch to various simple password patterns t.password for twitter... f.password for facebook... or maybe fb.password... etc. That's still an improvement. Even simple patters require some effort to break.

Some fraction will use a harder patterns that aren't immediately obvious. That's an improvement. Lets say my password is "stupidgdog" for google. Maybe your automated phishing tools will try stupidfdog on facebook... but maybe not.

Some fraction will use a slightly harder pattern.

Lets say I use stupidgHdog as my google password. My new pattern is still simple. its "stupid" + "first name of domain" + "next letter in alphabet capitalized" + "dog"

With just one sample, are you really sure your automated phishing tools going to figure out that facebook is: stupidfGdog ? And twitter its stupidtUdog?

And that's still pretty lazy as passwords go.

Some smal fraction will take the hint and use much harder patterns. That will take several fished passwords for the user and probably some human eyes to figure out. This is an improvement.

Lets say my google password is: C69.7Germanium what's my facebook password?

Here... I give you twitter on this pattern too: N47.8Vanadium.
With 2 samples passwords you've got enough of a pattern to try and brute force it... letter + 3 digits + element... 26* 1000 * 118... 2.6 million passwords to try.

Very doable if its a targeted search on a particular user... but your probably not going to spend the time looking at each fished password and then write a script to do that specific search... for just one random user. Probably.

And some fraction of people will switch to using a password safe or something, and thats an improvement too.

Re:Put on the popcorn

[Nemyst]

For what it's worth, LastPass will already warn you if a password is reused across two different domains. You need to explicitly set a list of equivalences if two domains share the same backend, for example.

"scrambled" version

[NotInHere]

Can you please stop with this plebs speak? This is a site for nerds, not for non-technical people. Say "hash" when you mean "hash". I mean is researching actual technical info so hard? For everyone not wanting to click links: its comparing the first 37 bits of the hash, using the SHA-1 hash mechanism. And yes its salted.

Re:"scrambled" version

[xxxJonBoyxxx]

>> So basically, Google is giving you access to their hash, salt, and saying "Enjoy unlimited cracking attempts...

Not exactly. The 37-bit version is just less than 25% of the full 160-bit SHA-1 so, as the source mentions (https://raw.githubusercontent.com/google/password-alert/master/SECURITY.md) the intent is to keep enough of the password to tell when the same password has been tried twice, but not enough of the hash to allow someone to authoritatively crack it. (I hope - haven't seen the proof of 37-is-the-right-number yet.)

This isn't the first time someone's used hashes with high collision rates to see if the same passwords are being tried without actually storing enough of a hash to flag the password. See this article for a different example (trying to tell badly configured clients from brute forcing attempts): http://www.filetransferconsult...

Re:"scrambled" version

[thegarbz]

I would rather a faithfully quoted news article then someone try and come up with some meaning that isn't there. Slashdot is not a news site, it's an aggregator. It doesn't publish news, it publishes links to news and when it does I am happier knowing that parts of the article are quoted accurately.

Every time we let the editors off the rails to form their own opinions on subjects it turns out badly for readers.

Re:Wait..

[Etherwalk]

Ah! Yes, that makes sense if it's only catching the page by your having entered the password.

Re:So like the cops...

[swillden]

So like the cops... it shows up only after the crime has been committed, and only protects some of the population (Google passwords) and not the rest of the population (e.g. your banking password isn't protected, because it's not a Google site).

Seems slightly less than useful.

I disagree.

If you use Gmail as your primary e-mail then your Google password is the crown jewel of your online identity, since every other site out there (including your bank) uses e-mail as the password reset channel. Sure it might be nice if the tool were more general-purpose (though that would require changing the hashing strategy, which intentionally uses relatively few bits as a security measure to protect against brute force), but if you can protect only one password, your e-mail password is the one.

For people who use not just Gmail but lots of Google services, it's even more critical. I store lots of important stuff in Drive, have my phone report my exact location, have my whole address book synced, etc., etc. It doesn't concern me to have so many eggs in one basket because I trust Google to maintain good security, but it can only be as good as my authentication. I use 2FA, but there's still value in being careful with such an important password.

Why an extension?

[Begemot]

Users who are savvy enough to find and install this extension are less likely to fall for phishing.
Users who may fall for phishing may not hear about the extension or do not know how to install it.
Why not build it in the browser itself?

Google is on to something here

[dskoll]

Google is on to something, but the implementation is wrong. First of all, this facility should be built in to browsers, not added as an extension. Secondly, it needs to be generalized: Just as browsers currently ask "Would you like to save this username/password for www.somesite.example", they should also ask "Would you like to lock this username/password combination to www.somesite.example?" and offer the usual "Yes / No / Not now" choices.

If you say "Yes", then the browser should alert you every time it sees that password on a different site.

Re:scrambled eh?

[tepples]

Then why isn't Chrome's list of saved non-Google passwords encrypted in a way that only Chrome can decrypt, such as with a key derived from the user's Google account password?