Infinity USB Unlimited
This software review is a bit different this time. The software for the Infinity USB Unlimited is so much similar to the software of the Infinity USB and the Infinity USB Phoenix, that I found it overdone to present you an almost identical copy of those tutorials.
Compared to the other Infinity software reviews, the new software that comes with the Unlimited version supports a far greater number of cards now. The current list is truly impressive. Just have a look at the (photoshopped) screenshot below.
All these cards can now easily be programmed from within the software itself. So no need for any 3rd party software if you are going to program any of the cards in the list. Just point & shoot, or to be precise: select your file(s) and click program. That's about it. And if you want to know how that works, just turn to the Infinity USB page.
And that is all I want to tell you about card programming with the Infinity USB Unlimited. This tutorial will be about the new tool that is provided by WBE: the PasswordSafe utility.
Infinity PasswordSafe is a utility for storing and managing username/password combinations on a smartcard. Not all cards are supported yet, but the ones that can currently be used are all Atmel AT90S8515 based cards: Funcard1-Funcard7, PrussianCard1-PrussianCard5 and DragonLoaderCard.
The number of username/password combinations that can be stored on a single card, depends on the amount of memory on the card. Just keep in mind this rule of thumb: the number of combinations that can be stored is equal to the amount of memory in Kbit minus 2. So on a normal funcard-2 with a 24C64 EEprom, you can store 64 - 2 = 62 combinations.
Oke then, for those of you that don't have their calculator at hand I have done a few sample calculations for you :-))
- Funcard / Funcard2 (AT90S8515 + 24C64) - 62 combinations
- Funcard3 / PrussianCard (AT90S8515 + 24C128) - 126 combinations
- Funcard4 / PrussianCard (AT90S8515 + 24C256) - 254 combinations
- etc.
So how does it work?
If you have downloaded PasswordSafe from my download archive or from the WBE website, you run the installation procedure. But before you start, there is one thing you should know. During installation setup, you can specify if you would like PasswordSafe to start automatically on Windows startup. You cannot change this setting from the PasswordSafe menu later. If you want to change that setting, you will need to (re-)install the whole program again.
Assuming you have installed the PasswordSafe software, now is the time to run the program and prepare your first card. So start PasswordSafe.
You will see an extra icon apear in the Sytem Tray or systray as it's called (see below):
Now doubleclick that icon in the systray and the mainwindow will open and show you an empty list like tis one:
Now you can insert a valid card. Your old funcard 2 will do nicely. Upon insertion of the card, you will se a new popup screen appear, warning you that the card does not contain a suitable format yet (see below):
Click the OK button to close this window.
Go to the Tools menu in the menu bar and select the option Format. The next popup will appear.
In this screen you need to enter a master password for your PasswordSafe card. So this will be the password that you need to memorize. And to help you determine the strength of your password, there are some hints on what kind of characters to use, like a combination of upper case and lower case letters, numbers and the total number of characters. If you follow these hints, you will see the "Overall Strenght" indicator turn yellow or green, depending on the strength of you password. A good password should be complex enough so that it cannot be easily guessed. If you "Overall Strength" indicator is green, it should be reasonably safe (see below). And you can name your card. It's always good to be able to identify your card.
Next hit the Start button. The card will be formatted. Depending on the size of the memory this can take up to a few minutes. When ready, you will be notified by another popup (see below):
Close the Master Password window:
You will now be asked to login to your PasswordSafe card by entering you Master Password (see below):
Now we are going to store some passwords on the card.
If you have followed all the instructions, you should see this screen with an empty pasword list (see below):
Click the Add button and the password entry popup will appear (see below):
You fill out all fields and when done, hit the OK button.
Enter more passwords in the same way if you like.
When your add more combinations, you will see them listed in the main screen (see below):
To make it easier to retrieve your passwords when needed, a shortcut key is assigned to the PasswordSafe systray program. The default shortcut is F11 but you may change that by selecting the option Settings from the Tools menu. You will see this window pop up (see below):
At this point you can also set some program defaults according to your preference:
- Minimize mainwindow to tray on startup - If checked, the main window will minimize directly to the systray when the program is started.
- Always paste passwords only - Will only paste the password in the field where your cursor is located.
- Show username and password in list - Shows username and password on the password list and popup, if checked.
- Show passwords in plaintext - Be carefull with this one, this option will show the password in plaintext (not ********). The option "Show username and password in list" must be checked for this to work.
Oke then, there you have it. Your first PasswordSafe card is ready for use.
So how do you use it now? Well let's show by an example.
I am a member on the dutch satellite board sat4all.com and I stored my login details on the PasswordSafe card. Now whenever I want to login on sat4all, I let PasswordSafe handle the password. This is how it works:
1. Make sure your PasswordSafe program is running (icon must be visible in the systray).
2. If the card is not in the programmer now, put it in and login to your card with the correct master password.
At this point I start the website (www.sat4all.com) in my browser and I am asked for my username and password. So now I will execute the following steps:
1. I press the shortcut key F11 on my keuboard to pop up the PasswordSafe program.
2. I right-click on the appropriate line (the one containing the sat4all details).
3. I select what I want PasswordSafe to do for me.
The sat4all forum software will not respond correctly to using the option Username
I have found that some forums will handle the Username
Success