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| <title>How secure storage works</title> |
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| <h1 class="Head">How secure storage works</h1> |
| <p>Let's consider a concrete example of Git integration. When you specify a password for a Git connection, the |
| application offers you an option to save your user name and password using secure storage.</p> |
| <p align="center"><img alt="Schema of secure storage encrypting data" src= |
| "../images/equinox_secure_storage_start.svg"><br></p> |
| <p align="center"><b>Picture 1. How secure storage works.</b></p> |
| <p>Your Git password is passed as data to secure storage. Secure storage uses a "master" password to encrypt it and |
| store the encrypted Git password in a file on disk.</p> |
| <p>The master password is obtained from a password provider module. The master passwords are obtained in a "lazy" |
| fashion, only when they are about to be used. Password providers can use different techniques:</p> |
| <ul> |
| <li>on <i>Windows</i>, the master password is generated as a random value that is encrypted based on your Windows |
| login information and stored in secure storage;</li> |
| <li>on <i>macOS</i>, the master password is initially created as a random value that is stored in the OS |
| keyring;</li> |
| <li>the default password provider simply prompts you for a password;</li> |
| <li>other password providers might be supplied in your application.</li> |
| </ul> |
| <p>When data is saved with secure storage, the password provider is selected based on the priorities from the list of |
| enabled password providers. Only that provider can be used in future to decrypt the data.</p> |
| <h3 class="related">Related concepts</h3><a href="ref-securestorage-start.htm">Secure storage</a><br> |
| <a href="ref-securestorage-recovery.htm">Password recovery</a><br> |
| <a href="ref-securestorage-passwd.htm">Life of a master password</a> |
| <h3 class="related">Related reference</h3><a href="ref-securestorage-prefs.htm">Secure storage preference |
| page</a><br> |
| <a href="ref-securestorage-options.htm">Secure storage runtime options</a> |
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