LastPass hacked: How to export and protect your passwords

You can leave LastPass and move elsewhere in just minutes.

- ALAINA YEE

LastPass is no stranger to data breaches. It's suffered several high-profile leaks, with the most recent (and alarming) incident happening just last year. When news first broke in August, the developer assured everyone that customers were unaffected. But in a complete reversal, the company's December updates were grim (fave.co/3XDTctq)-customer data had been taken after all.

If you're feeling like you want to leave the service, you can hardly be blamed. In this latest breach, not only was personally-identifying information like billing addresses, telephone numbers, and IP addresses stolen, but vault data as well. Most damning: Some of that vault data was unencrypted.

The good news is that exporting your data is quick and relatively straightforward. You get the entire vault in a single file that you can then use to upload to a new password manager (fave.co/3IRkfRz).

Here's how to export your passwords from LastPass-and how to do it securely. Plus, learn what you should do afterward to ensure the safety of all your online accounts.

HOW TO EXPORT YOUR LASTPASS PASSWORDS

Getting your passwords out of LastPass is actually very easy. More complicated is ensuring the exported file remains secure. LastPass exports in either CSV and XML file formats, and those file types aren't encrypted.

You don't want your passwords downloaded as plain text-even if you delete the file, it can still be recoverable on an unencrypted drive. And many people haven't encrypted their PC drives.