How to Share a Password Safely | Why to Avoid Email and Chat, and What to Use Instead

First, check whether you can avoid sharing at all

Handing over a password also means you can no longer tell who did what on that account. Many services offer ways to give someone access without giving them the password. Look for those first.

Deciding “setting up an invitation is a hassle, so I’ll just send the ID and password” is what ends up costing the most. A password once handed over stays with the other person until you change it. This has nothing to do with whether you trust them: the result is the same if someone else gets into their device or mailbox.

Why sending passwords by email or chat is risky

This is a different issue from “it’s encrypted, so it’s fine”. The danger is less about the message in transit and more about what remains after it is sent.

• It stays: emails and chats remain in the history unless deleted. Turning them up in a search years later is normal.
• It is searchable: search for “password” and they come up in a list. It is the first word searched for when an account is taken over.
• It gets forwarded or quoted: if the whole thread is forwarded to someone else, the password in the body goes with it.
• It outlives the job: in group chats, removed members can sometimes still view past messages.
• It syncs to devices: the same mail may be synced to a family tablet or a spare device that other people use.
• It goes to the wrong person: sending to someone with a similar name via autocomplete is a mistake that really does happen often.

Comparing ways to share

These are the options when you cannot avoid sharing. The higher in the table, the less likely the password is to linger after you hand it over.

Splitting the channels is easy but of limited value. If email and chat can both be read on the same device, splitting them achieves almost nothing. If you split, use channels of different kinds, such as email and a phone call.

Steps for handing a password over

1. 1

   Replace it with a password just for sharing

   Never hand over a string you also use elsewhere. Create a new one with a password generator, change the account to it, then hand it over. Generation happens on your device, and the string you create is not stored anywhere.

2. 2

   Decide who gets it

   Check whether that one person is really enough. Widening it to “the whole department, just in case” means more people to contact when it has to be changed later.

3. 3

   Choose a channel that leaves no trace

   Use a password manager’s sharing feature or a self-destructing note with an expiry. If neither is available, split the ID and the password across two channels of different kinds.

4. 4

   Confirm they received it

   Ask not “did it arrive?” but “could you log in?”. If you skip this, you will be asked to resend it later, and at that point it is tempting to fall back on an easy method.

5. 5

   Delete it on your side

   If you had no choice but to use chat or email, delete it, including from your sent items and sent messages. Ask the other person to delete it too.

6. 6

   Record who you gave it to

   Note the account name, the person and the date. Without this record, when a change is needed later you will not know who is affected.

Managing it after you share

Sharing does not end with the handover. Think of a shared password as something that “drifts towards a state where nobody knows how many people know it”, and review it at the following times.

• When someone leaves: resignation, transfer, a change of role, the end of a relationship. Change it as a matter of procedure, not because you suspect them.
• Regular reviews: every six months, look at the list of shared accounts and check whether each share is still needed. End shares that are no longer used.
• When someone reports a lost device: change all the passwords that person knows.
• When you stop sharing: removing the share in a password manager does not help if the other person copied it down. For important accounts, change the password itself as well as removing the share.

If you share an account protected by two-factor authentication, you also need to decide whose device receives the codes. If they go to one person’s mobile phone, nobody can log in while that person is away. Where possible, the proper fix is to switch to issuing individual accounts.

FAQ

How dangerous is it to send a password by email?

The problem is less whether it can be intercepted in transit and more that it stays in the history afterwards. Email can be searched, forwarded and synced to several devices. If the mailbox is compromised years later, old passwords can be read as they are. If you really must use email, treat it on the assumption that you will change the password after handing it over.

Is it OK for a family to share online banking or subscription passwords?

Some services forbid sharing in their terms, so first check whether there is a family plan or a family feature. Financial services often do not allow sharing, and if damage occurs while an account is shared you may not be covered. Even where sharing is allowed, it is safest to use a password manager’s sharing feature and give that account a string of its own.

How should a team manage a shared account?

As far as possible, stop using shared accounts and issue individual ones. That way it is recorded who did what, and when someone leaves you remove only them. If a shared account is truly necessary, keep it in a password manager’s sharing feature, review the list of shared accounts regularly, and always change the password when someone leaves.

Should I change the password when I stop sharing it?

Yes. Removing the share in a password manager has no effect if the other person copied it somewhere else. Treat removing the share and changing the password as a single task, then redistribute the new password to the remaining people you share with; that way nothing slips through.