Custom Magento admin config password encryption

magento, password-encryption

Solution

<sftp_password translate="label">
      <label>SFTP Password</label>
       <frontend_type>obscure</frontend_type>
      <backend_model>adminhtml/system_config_backend_encrypted</backend_model>
      <sort_order>10</sort_order>
      <show_in_default>1</show_in_default>
      <show_in_website>1</show_in_website>
      <show_in_store>0</show_in_store>
</sftp_password>

// assuming that getConfigData return Mage::getStoreConfig($path, $storeId);
$this->getConfigData('sftp_password');

frontend_type : Password v.s Obscure

Obscure extend password, but for security reasons it replace the length of the actual password number of `'*'s` with 6 `'*'s` so you can't tell the length of the password

See /lib/Varien/Data/Form/Element/

Read more @ XML for Admin Configurations

Problem

I need the password for an sftp server as a config field for a Magento module I'm working on. Adding the field is straightforward enough, but Magento doesn't actually encrypt the value just because it has a `frontend_type` of `password`. ``` <sftp_password translate="label"> <label>SFTP Password</label> <frontend_type>password</frontend_type> <sort_order>170</sort_order> <show_in_default>1</show_in_default> <show_in_website>1</show_in_website> <show_in_store>1</show_in_store> </sftp_password> ``` I haven't been able to find documentation on how to properly encrypt this value. How can I ensure the password gets encrypted when it's stored in the database?

Original source