While the rest of us don’t have the fate of Cell Block H in our hands, we do have the responsibility to protect our own passwords. (A note to anyone concerned about a possible breach of privacy: the memo, by the time it reached me, was six months old, and has since been destroyed.) Clearly, the officer overlooked the injunction in the memo, regarding his password, “don’t share it with anyone”. “Your computer access codes are as follows …” it reads, and goes on to provide the recipient (a 25-year-old corrections officer, presumably the previous reader of the book) of his login and password information for both the department’s Windows system and the state’s Victim’s Assistance Portal.
Last week, however, only hours after reading the news of an apparent attempt by Chinese hackers to access personnel files of US government employees, I stumbled across something rather more worrying: a memo from the captain heading the women’s division of Department of Corrections of the State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations. That’s kind of a dick move.Every library user knows that from time to time, you stumble across items that someone else, in a fit of absent-mindedness, stuck in the book that you’ve just borrowed: a postcard, a bookmark, a letter, a shopping list. Instead, it’s forcing users to pay for features they’ve previously enjoyed for free, at a time when they may not be able to afford any extra expense. Arguably, if LastPass wanted to be generous, it could’ve grandfathered in existing free users while putting these restrictions on new users. While it’s true that LastPass Premium is pretty affordable, the dire economic pressures triggered by the pandemic haven’t disappeared either. Given that many people are increasingly online during the pandemic, a free password manager is an invaluable tool.
One of the biggest strengths of LastPass was that you didn’t have to pay for a password manager that was just as capable as some paid alternatives. Meanwhile, competitors like Dashlane and Keeper already limit access to a single device for free users. Many features that you might turn to a password manager for - like multi-user support or password sharing - often do require a subscription. Google, Mozilla, and Apple all offer robust built-in password managers into Chrome, Firefox, and Safari for free. Unfortunately, it’s not unthinkable that LastPass is trying to squeeze a few extra dollars out of free users who may have gotten used to multi-device access.
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