Mac Caching Wrong Password, but Where

December 10, 2010 10:18 AM

My Mac (10.3.9) seems to be automatically providing an outdated network password to my work network. Since the password is consistently wrong, it's causing my new, working password to lock up. Where might that password be stored? I've already removed anything from the key chain.

I'm using Classic to load Outlook 2001 to access our exhange server. I removed any password from the classic key chain and the os X key chain.

This happens whether Firefox launches or not, so it's not a password saved in the browser. This happens whether I launch Outlook or not. Basically just booting the machine with an active network connection is causing it to authenticate to the network with a bad password.

I tried looking in Activity Monitor, but didn't see anything that was immediately obvious to me (not that I'd be 100% sure what to look for in there). I tried putting Little Snitch on the machine, but a version that can run on such an old OS (10.3.9) doesn't seem to report as well as the newer versions of Little Snitch.

I'm stumped as to where else a password may be cached. Does anybody have any ideas?

posted by willnot to computers & internet (7 answers total)

Applications > Utilities > Keychain Access.app

There should be an entry for the network UID and password. You can simply delete the entry and close Keychain Access. The entry will be rebuilt when you enter them the next time you log-in to the network.

You can also edit the Keychain entry.
posted by Thorzdad at 10:37 AM on December 10, 2010

The only thing in my keychain is:
Safari Forms AutoFill (application password)
electronics for imaging (certificate)
VeriSign Class 3 Code Signing 2004 CA (certificate)
WebEx Communications Inc. (certificate).

I don't think the password is in Keychain.
posted by willnot at 10:43 AM on December 10, 2010

You may have a network drive ( or share) mounting on boot. If so remove it and reboot.
posted by Gungho at 10:44 AM on December 10, 2010

One other bit of info, creating a new user doesn't help, so it seems like something specific to the system in general.
posted by willnot at 11:32 AM on December 10, 2010

Mac OS of that era still used a tool called Netinfo Manager for handling networks and privileges. You might poke (very carefully) around in there and see if your old password is somehow maintained as a setting. Unfortunately, modern versions of Mac OS no longer use this tool, so I can't load it myself and give you any guidance.

Take a look at Applications -> Utilities -> NetInfo Manager

This Wikipedia article may also be useful.
posted by fremen at 12:37 PM on December 10, 2010

Configuring 10.3.9 for Active Directory. You should disable Auto Log in and select List of users or Name and Password.( step 17.)
posted by Gungho at 12:42 PM on December 10, 2010

IIRC there's both a per-user keychain and a systemwide keychain. I don't remember how to look at the system keychain on 10.3.x, but presumably there's an option in Keychain Access.app to make it show up. Maybe you can go to /Library/Keychains and doubleclick on the System keychain that's in that directory to edit it.
posted by hattifattener at 2:28 PM on December 10, 2010