Firefox Send gets password protection upgrade

Users of Mozilla Firefox's Send file sharing service and Firefox experiment may protect files with passwords in the latest iteration of the service.

The organization launched Firefox Send back in July of 2011 as one of three new Test Pilot experiments (the other two were Voice and Fill Notes).

What made Send special was the fact that it could be used without participation in the Test Pilot program. Anyone, Firefox users and users who use other web browsers, could open the Firefox Send website to send files to others.

Send works like any other file sharing service on the Internet. Drop files on the service's website to upload them to the service. It has a an upper limit of 1 Gigabyte per file, but no other restriction that I'm aware of (file types for instance).

Send creates a unique URL that you can copy to the Clipboard after the upload finishes. While the URL is unique, it is publicly accessible which means in theory that it is possible to brute force the service to download files that other users of the service have uploaded.

The new version of Send puts an end to this, at least for users who enable the optional password protection option.

The option is displayed after the file is uploaded to Send. You need to check the "Require a password to download this file" box on that page to enable it. Send displays a password field when you do. Type the desired password and select the "add password" button afterwards to apply it.

This password protects the file. Users who open the share link in a browser are prompted for the password when they do. There is no option to download the file anywhere unless the password is entered correctly.

The download link is displayed once you enter the password and hit the unlock button, provided that it is the correct one to decrypt the file.

All other parameters of Firefox Send remain the same: file download links expire after 24 hours, and uploaders may delete the file at any time.

Closing Words

Password protection improves the security of files uploaded to Firefox Send. While adding passwords adds another bit of information to the sharing process, as you need to share the download link and the password, it protects files from being stumbled upon by accident (as unlikely as this is).