Roboform Roboform Pro 6.9 review

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Verdict:

Roboform is a useful tool for filling in forms and remembering passwords.

Review Date: 20 Dec 2009

Price when reviewed: £20

Supplier: http://www.roboform.com

Our Rating 4 stars out of 5

Review
Specs

Roboform is a password and identity management application that remembers your passwords so that you don't have to.

Each time you log in to a site, the program - which installs itself as a toolbar on Internet Explorer - prompts you to create an identity for it. The next time you visit the site, you can tell Roboform to fill in your login details for you with a single click. It's beguilingly simple and means you won't have to bother remembering all those different passwords any more.

As you'd expect, your Roboform identities are password protected, with a master password that you choose during setup. It's also encrypted with the AES encryption standard, which the US government uses to protect classified data. Roboform will even generate random passwords made up of gibberish that's practically impossible to guess.

As well as logging into websites, Roboform can fill in web forms for you. Simply provide the Identity Editor with any details you'd like Roboform to be able to fill in - anything from your name and address to more sensitive information such as your bank or credit card details. Then, when you have to fill in a form, for instance when signing up to a website, click on your name on the toolbar and Roboform will fill in the fields for which it has data.

The online password store allows you to save your identities Roboform's server so that you can access and use them from any PC. This allows you to access your favourite sites while you're at a friend's house or in an internet café. This feature is still in beta, it worked in our test.

Some will be uneasy about storing all their personal details this way, but it's the same information most of us enter into numerous online shops. Still, we were in two minds about Roboform: £20 isn't cheap, and many browsers already offer password management functions. It's very good at what it does, with online storage, auto-generated passwords and form filling convenience - but we would keep a paper backup of everything somewhere safe, too.

Author: Karl Wright

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User comments

Works for me; online store is also a backup

I've used Roboform for years now and it has been great. I've used the online service for 3 or 4 months with no problems. It also synchronises across different PCs, or in my case to a version on a U3 memory stick that I carry about.
I'm a lot happier trusting Roboform with this than I am most web sites that claim to need it, or to a browser.
There are also notes that you can create, in my case for software I have or for sites like some banks that need random characters from a password, or a rotating secret question.
The developers were responsive too to feature requests for the desktop. version (not so good for the pocket PC, perhaps due to its operating system. However, that does let me access all this data securely wherever I have my HD2 phone, without need for an internet connection)

By fellwalker2000 on 11 Jan 2010