How to Enable the Built-in Random Password Generator in Mozilla Firefox

[The AchieVer]

How to Enable the Built-in Random Password Generator in Mozilla Firefox 

 

Passwords are here to stay, there’s no doubt about that, despite some companies, including software giant Microsoft, pushing for alternatives based on biometrics or other solutions.

 

The best thing we can do right now, however, is to use more complex passwords that are more difficult to hack. And because we spend most of our time online in a browser, these apps could make it more convenient to use such passwords.

Mozilla, for example, which is the maker of the world’s second most-used browser, plans to provide users with a random password generator, which would technically make dictionary-based hacking attempts a lot more difficult.

In essence, the purpose of this new tool is to provide you with a random password whenever you create a new account. Because it includes a more complex syntax, and not a combination that’s easy to guess, it would be harder for hackers to break into your accounts.

Firefox would then store your password within the app and provide it whenever you return to the same page for easy authentication. In other words, you don’t necessarily need to remember the password because Firefox does the whole thing for you.

As per ZDNet, this feature will become available with the release of Firefox 79 69, which is due in September, but Mozilla has already starting testing it with the help of Nightly builds. In other words, anyone who installs this experimental versions of the browser can see what the random password generator is all about and try it out ahead of the public launch in the fall.

 

 

It all comes down to two separate flags that need to be enabled manually in the Nightly builds of Firefox.

First and foremost, make sure that you are running the latest version of the Nightly browser. I tested this tutorial on build 69.0a1 (2019-06-26) (64-bit) and everything worked well.

After launching Firefox Nightly, enter the advanced flag configuration screen by typing the following code in the address bar:

about:config

Next, you need to search for two different settings that you’ll have to enable. The two flags are:

signon.generation.available
signon.generation.enabled

By default, these two flags are set to false, which means they are disabled. So click the toggle button to switch them to true, therefore enabled. In other words:

false = disabled
true = enabled

There’s no need to reboot Firefox to apply your changes, and the way you can test the new password generator is pretty simple.
 

 

 

All you have to do is head over to an account registration page, such as the one of Google that you can see in the screenshots here, and click the password field. By default, Firefox should now suggest a randomly-generated password that features a high complexity, therefore it’s much more difficult to crack. You can simply click that password to use it for the new account.

After enabling the aforementioned flags (setting them to a true value), Firefox then activates a new option in the settings screen to allow the browser to “suggest and generate strong passwords.” You can find the new option under:

Firefox > Menu > Options > Privacy & Security > Logins and Passwords

Needless to say, because this feature is still a work in progress and only available in the experimental version of Firefox, it could sometime fail to work properly. More refinements should be made in the coming updates, as Mozilla will continue to improve it ahead of the estimated release date set for September in Firefox 69.

 

 

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