Google preps Chrome password-blab bug fix

A few months after the bug was discovered, Google's decided it should experiment with a fix for its Chrome password exposure bug feature.

As El Reg noted back in August:

“If the victim, shall we say, is using Chrome, surf over to chrome://settings/passwords, click on a starred-out saved website password and click on "Show"; rinse and repeat down the list. Voila, you can see his or her passwords in plain text.”

While it only works if someone can access someone else's machine, it's easy enough to imagine that your average workplace probably has a sufficient combination of naively-trustful users and occasionally malicious workmates to make it a serious issue (not to mention kids seeking Dad's online shopping password stash).

François Beaufort of Google France has now posted this code for review.

Right now, the code for the experimental flag has only been added to the latest Mac build of the Chrome browser, but the idea is straightforward:

“Once you've enabled the chrome://flags/#enable-password-manager-reauthentication flag, the user who's trying to reveal a plain text password in chrome://settings/passwords will be prompted to reauthenticate with the User Mac OS password.”

The authentication window is open for one minute.

Presumably if the fix is welcomed and successful, it will be implemented in other versions of Chrome. ®