Proton Pass Tutorial: Free Password Manager — Step-by-Step Guide & Transcript

[00:00] If you're like many people these days, you've  got your password saved somewhere in Chrome or   Google Password Manager. And it's convenient, but  Google holds the encryption keys to that data,   which means they have the ability to access  your passwords if they ever chose to or if  

[00:15] they're compelled to by a government or court  order. And because your passwords are tied to   your Google account, if that account ever gets  hacked, every password you have goes with it.   Hi, I'm Garrick and today we're going to look  at Proton Pass, a free password manager that  

[00:30] encrypts everything so nobody, not even Proton  itself, can see your passwords. So, what exactly   is Proton Pass? At its core, it's a password  manager. And like most password managers, it  

[00:42] saves your usernames and passwords and fills them  in automatically when you visit a website. But it   goes beyond that in a couple of important ways.  First, everything is end-to-end encrypted, which  

[00:54] means your passwords are scrambled before they  ever leave your device. Proton can't read them.   Nobody can without your master password. Proton  uses what's called a zero-knowledge model. That   means your passwords are encrypted on your device  before they ever reach Proton’s servers. Proton  

[01:09] never receives the key needed to decrypt them.  So, even if Proton were hacked or subpoenaed,   there's nothing to hand over. Second, if you're  already using another password manager, you can   import your entire vault into Proton Pass in just  a few steps. So, switching doesn't mean starting  

[01:25] from scratch. And third, and this is the feature I  really want to highlight today, it lets you create   email aliases. These are fake email addresses that  forward mail to your real inbox. I'll explain why  

[01:37] that's so useful in a few minutes. And the great  thing is all of these features I've mentioned so   far are part of the free subscription plan which  for most people is all you need to get started.   Go to proton.me/pass in your browser. Here you  can sign up as an individual. Then create your  

[01:56] account with your email address and password. Now  if you want you can also create a free Proton Mail   account from here which gives you an encrypted  email address. Think of it as a Gmail alternative   built around privacy. Your emails are end-to-end  encrypted, so not even Proton can read them. We're  

[02:12] not going to get into Proton Mail in this video,  but it's a great companion to Proton Pass if you   ever want to take your privacy a step further. For  now, you can just use your existing email address,   the sign up process, you'll be prompted to  download the Proton Pass extension for your  

[02:30] browser. You can see it auto-detects the browser  you're using, but you can download the plug-in   for Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Brave, or Edge. I'm  currently in Chrome, so I see Get Proton Pass for   Chrome. That takes me to the Chrome Web Store. And  here I'll click add to Chrome, then add extension.

[02:51] And depending on your browser, once it's  installed, the Proton Pass icon will either   appear in your browser toolbar right away, or if  you don't see it, you'll see these instructions   on how to add the extension to your toolbar.  So, here in Chrome, it's saying to open the  

[03:03] extensions menu, pin Proton Pass to your toolbar,  and then click the icon anytime to open it. So,   I'll come up here to extensions and  click the pin button. And here it is. So,  

[03:16] now I can click the Proton Pass button. And the  first time you do this, you'll be asked to sign   into the account that you just created. Now,  if you already use a service like Proton Mail,   you can use that same account. All of Proton’s  services are connected under one login.

[03:34] to access all of its features. Notice all the  different things you can do with Pass here,   like manually create a login for a website,  save a credit card, add an encrypted note,  

[03:47] and so on. Basically, this is your vault and it's  where all of your saved items live. Right now,   it's empty, so let's add some  passwords to it. The easiest   way to save a password is to just log  into a website like you normally would.

[04:04] As you can see, Proton Pass will automatically  detect the login and ask if you want to save   it. Click add and it's instantly stored in your  encrypted vault. Now, if I log out of this site

[04:18] and then go to log back in, notice there's a  number badge here in the Proton Pass icon here in   this field. And you can see that it's displaying  that it has one saved login for this site. So,   I can click my login information here and it  automatically fills it in. And just like that, I'm  

[04:36] back in. So, Pass gives you quick access to your  saved encrypted passwords with just a few clicks.   And when you're signing up for a new account  somewhere, Proton Pass will offer to generate a   strong unique password for you. For example, first  I'll click in the email field and Pass offers to  

[04:51] use my existing email address or we can have it  generate an email alias. I'll come back to that   momentarily. I'll just use my real email for this  example. And when I click in the password field,   it suggests a strong password like this random  string of characters you see here. Something  

[05:06] nobody could ever guess. Now, if we click the  button, you can adjust the password attributes,   which is useful if the site you're signing up  for has specific requirements for passwords,   like using capital letters or a certain number  of characters. Just click the auto-generated  

[05:22] password and Proton Pass will fill it  in. And then we can click add so that it   remembers it for you so you never have to.  And the next time you sign into this site,   it can autofill the password it generated. Now,  you might have noticed how convenient it is to  

[05:35] get to your Pass vault from the browser toolbar.  But you might also be wondering, "What if someone   opens up my browser? Do they have access to all  of my passwords?" And the short answer is yes,   because by default, the security of your vault  assumes you securely log into your computer.  

[05:49] But if you're concerned about someone getting  into your browser when you step away for a bit,   you can add an extra layer of security  by going to and to security. Here under   unlock with the default is none and you  can see that it says Proton Pass will  

[06:04] always be accessible. So if your computer is  unlocked so is pass. I suggest switching this   to a PIN code. Then enter a six-digit  code that you'll definitely remember.

[06:18] With the PIN code active Pass will auto-lock  after the time specified in this menu here. You   can choose from 1 minute to 1 hour. I prefer  to set it to 1 minute because after 1 minute   of not using it, you'll need to enter your  PIN number to unlock pass, which to me isn't  

[06:33] really that inconvenient and it ensures that my  passwords are safe if I walk away from my unlocked   computer. Notice it's asking me to confirm  my PIN code before it changes this setting.

[06:45] Now, you can also manually lock Pass from this  menu at any time by choosing Lock Extension,   and that requires you to enter  your PIN to use it again.

[06:58] Notice there is a biometrics option here, but  that requires you to use the Proton Pass desktop   app. And there's even an option to add an extra  password to Proton Pass. So getting into your   vault will require two passwords. But in this  case, I'm just going to leave the PIN code option  

[07:13] selected, which I think strikes the balance  between security and convenience. Okay. Now,   for the feature I mentioned at the start, email  aliases. Here's the problem they solve. Every   time you sign up for a new website or service,  you're handing over your real email address.  

[07:28] That company might sell it to advertisers, they  might get breached, or they might just start   sending you junk. And once your real address  is out there, it's out there. With Proton Pass,   instead of giving a website your real email, you  generate an alias, which is a unique, randomly  

[07:44] created address that forwards all emails directly  to your real inbox. The website gets a substitute   email address. You still get their emails or  access to the account you created with them,   but your real address stays completely hidden.  And if that site ever sells your data or you  

[08:01] start getting spam, you can just delete the  alias. The spam stops immediately and your   real inbox was never at risk. So whenever you're  filling out a signup form to create an account on   a site and you click in the email address field,  notice the Proton Pass extension offers to either  

[08:16] use my existing email or to hide my email. So,  Proton Pass generates this email alias right   from here. So, I can choose to hide my email. And  this is the address it's generated in this case.  

[08:29] And then I would just continue throughout the rest  of the signup process. And the website never sees   my real email. And then when the site sends me a  confirmation email or a newsletter, it goes to my   alias first and then gets forwarded to the email  I signed up to Proton Pass with. And it looks just  

[08:44] like any other email on my end. In my Proton  Pass vault, I can see all of my aliases listed   here. And if I ever want to stop receiving mail  from a particular site, I can just toggle that  

[08:56] alias off. And that temporarily stops forwarding  messages to that address to my real inbox. Or I   can delete this address entirely by choosing  Move to Trash. On the Proton Pass free plan,  

[09:08] you get 10 aliases, which is a pretty solid start.  Now, a paid plan gives you unlimited aliases,   but even 10 is plenty to protect yourself on  the sites that matter the most to you. Now,   if you've already got passwords saved in Chrome or  Google Password Manager or Bitwarden, 1Password,  

[09:24] or another service, you can import them all into  Proton Pass without re-entering anything. First,   you'll need to export your passwords from your  existing password manager. Now, it is a little   different for each different manager. For example,  in Chrome, you'll go to to autofill and passwords  

[09:42] to password manager and you'll see the option  to export your passwords as a CSV file from   Chrome . I don't have any passwords saved in this  particular browser right now, but when you do,   you'll see the option to export them. Once you do  that, then go back to the Proton Pass extension,

[10:01] go to , and here choose import. Then select your  password manager and you'll be prompted to choose   the file that you exported and Proton Pass  will pull in all of your usernames, passwords,  

[10:13] and site URLs. So with the free version of  Proton Pass, you get unlimited saved logins,   unlimited passkeys, 10 email aliases,  and access on unlimited devices,   which is a pretty big deal because most free  password managers cap you at one device.  

[10:29] With Proton Pass, you can access your vault on  your desktop computer, your laptop, and your   mobile devices. And we didn't even talk about the  other included features like the ability to store   credit cards so you don't have to manually enter  them every time you want to buy something online,  

[10:43] and encrypted notes, which give you a secure place  to store important info like your passport number,   software license keys, and any other data that you  want to keep safe. So, that's a genuinely complete   password manager at no cost. Upgrading to Proton  Pass Plus or Pass Family if you want to set it up  

[11:00] for up to six other users, unlocks unlimited email  aliases, dark web monitoring that alerts you when   your credentials show up in a data breach, file  attachments in your vault, and emergency access,  

[11:12] which lets a trusted contact request access to  your vault if something happens to you. Upgrading   to Proton Unlimited also gives you access to  Proton Mail, Calendar, Drive, the VPN service,  

[11:24] and Docs. So, that's Proton Pass, a password  manager that's free on unlimited devices with   email aliases to protect your real address and  end to-end encryption that even Proton can't see  

[11:36] through. If you're already using Proton Mail  or any other Proton service, adding Pass is a   no-brainer. It's all under the same account.  And if you're brand new to Proton, this is a   great place to start. I'm Garrick. Thanks for  watching and we'll see you in the next one.