How to Leak Chrome Saved Passwords - When You Know the PC Account Password

This is Part 2 of the Chrome Password Hacking Series.

Chrome’s password autofill feature is convenient, but that convenience can hide a critical weakness.
If someone knows your PC account password, it effectively means your entire set of Chrome-stored passwords is exposed.

This is not a remote hack.
It’s a local attack, carried out by someone who can briefly sit in front of your unlocked PC.

Vulnerabilities in Chrome Password Auto-Fill

Chrome’s autofill function reduces login friction and is widely used, but from a security perspective,
the feature relies heavily on the Windows account password for protection.

In this article, we’ll look at how someone who knows your PC account password can view and extract all passwords stored in Chrome.
Before that, let’s walk through the basic steps Chrome offers for viewing saved passwords.

Why the PC Account Password Matters

Chrome requires your Windows account password when revealing a stored password in plain text.
It appears to be an extra authentication step, but in practice, this mechanism depends entirely on the PC account password.

Anyone who knows your PC login password can:

• Access Chrome’s password manager
• View individual passwords in plain text
• Export all stored passwords at once

No special tools or technical skills are needed.

If you’ve ever shared your PC password with a colleague,
or if family members know the password to your home computer,
you should assume your saved Chrome passwords can be accessed.

Method 1: Viewing Individual Passwords

This method reveals each saved password in Chrome one by one.
The steps are straightforward:

1. Click the three dots (More) at the upper-right corner of Chrome.
2. Select Settings from the menu.
3. In the left panel, choose Autofill and Passwords or Autofill.
4. Click Google Password Manager or Passwords to open your saved list.
5. Select the site whose password you want to check.
6. Click the eye icon next to the hidden password field.
7. A Windows dialog will appear asking for your PC account password.
8. After entering it, the password will be shown in plain text.

It’s a simple process and can be done in under a minute.

Method 2: Exporting All Passwords at Once

Chrome also provides a feature to export all saved passwords as a CSV file.
This function is intended for user convenience, but it becomes a major vulnerability in the wrong hands.

Here’s how it works:

1. Go to the Password Manager:
   Settings → Autofill and passwords → Google Password Manager
2. Click the gear icon in the upper-right corner.
3. Select Export passwords.
4. Dismiss the security warning by selecting Continue.
5. Enter your PC account password when prompted.
6. Chrome will download a file such as passwords.csv.

This CSV file contains all saved login information — site URL, username, and password — all stored in plain text.

Copying this file to a USB drive or emailing it elsewhere allows an attacker to remove your entire password set from the system within seconds.

Limits of Chrome’s Convenience Features

Chrome’s built-in password viewer and export tool require no hacking tools at all.
A person with physical access to your PC and knowledge of your login password can expose everything stored in Chrome.

Because the process is so simple, some might question whether this even qualifies as hacking.
But in practice, the outcome is identical to a full account takeover.

In households where passwords are shared, or in office environments with relaxed physical access,
Chrome’s password storage should not be considered a security feature.

It is strictly a convenience function, and relying on it for strong protection is risky.

In the next article, we’ll look at a different scenario —
how Chrome’s stored passwords can be leaked even when the attacker does not know the PC account password,
as long as the screen is unlocked.

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