British Gas deliberately breaks password managers and security experts are appalled

Update 16/7: British Gas says it’s reviewed its policy after feedback from customers and will work to allow password managers in the future.

Update: In light of this post and other feedback it has received, British Gas says it’s going to review its stance on password managers. Hooray!

@TheNextWeb We take digital security very seriously; in light of the feedback we’ll take a look at our approach to password managers. ^Matt

— British Gas (@BritishGas) July 15, 2015

Original story follows…

UK utility firm British Gas made a pretty startling admission on Twitter: It deliberately breaks password managers, such as LastPass and Dashlane.

@Sacro Hi Ben, I understand but as a business we've chosen not to have the compatibility with password managers. Thanks, Joe

— British Gas Help (@BritishGasHelp) July 14, 2015

Unsurprisingly, security experts are disappointed that the company has decided to make things harder for customers who want to use strong login credentials.

Here’s well-respected computer security expert Graham Cluley:

@BritishGasHelp @Sacro that's a very poor decision. Please reconsider

— Graham Cluley (@gcluley) July 15, 2015

And widely-followed Taylor Swift-themed security commentator InfoSec Taylor:

@gcluley @BritishGasHelp Take note of the bios of the people who are tweeting you. These are computer security experts trying to help, BG.

— SwiftOnSecurity (@SwiftOnSecurity) July 15, 2015

They’re just two of the many people in the know who have told the company it is making a big mistake. I’ve contacted British Gas to find out more about this patently short-sighted decision.

➤ British Gas [Twitter via Charles Arthur]

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Feat image: GIF created from British Gas TV commercial