Is it advisable to store a hashed password in a cookie?
cookies, encryption, hash, security
Solution
Remember, the hash of the password is effectively the same as their password. Somebody who stole the hash would have the same access to the user's account as if they had stolen their password. Therefore it is not advisable to store a hash of the user's password in a cookie unless there was some other information not stored with the cookie that is used to authenticate (i.e. 2-factor authentication).
Problem
I want user's to be able to select a "remember me" box on my website so they need not log in each time they come. So, I need to store a unique ID in a cookie to identify them. Is it safe to hash their password with sha512 and a long salt in PHP and store that value in the cookie? If the cookie was stolen, would their password be at risk? Obviously it must be connected to their password somehow, otherwise if the cookie value was guessed or stolen, the user would not be able to stop someone else logging in. Also, is it advisable to use a GUID at all as the unique identifier? Thanks, Ben