Gokey

A simple vaultless password manager in Go

Cybersecurity & Ethical HackingGoBSD-3-Clause

Abstract

Gokey is an open-source Cybersecurity & Ethical Hacking project. A simple vaultless password manager in Go. Instead of storing your passwords in a vault it derives your password on the fly from your master password and supplied _realm_ string (for example, resource URL). This way you do not have to manage, backup or sync your password vault (or trust its management to a third party) as your passwords are available immediately anywhere. It is built using Go. The complete source code is publicly available on GitHub under the BSD 3-Clause "New" or "Revised" License, making it a useful reference for students building a Cybersecurity & Ethical Hacking mini project or final-year project.

1. Introduction

Instead of storing your passwords in a vault it derives your password on the fly from your master password and supplied _realm_ string (for example, resource URL). This way you do not have to manage, backup or sync your password vault (or trust its management to a third party) as your passwords are available immediately anywhere.

2. Objective

A simple vaultless password manager in Go

This project demonstrates how Go can be applied to a real-world Cybersecurity & Ethical Hacking problem.

4. Technology Stack

Go

5. System Requirements

General requirements for this technology stack — check the README for exact versions.

  • Go 1.20 or later
  • Git (to clone the repository)

6. Installation & Setup

git clone https://github.com/cloudflare/gokey.git
cd gokey
go install github.com/cloudflare/gokey/cmd/gokey@latest

Full setup instructions are in the project README.

7. Future Enhancements

Suggested extensions you can add to make this your own project.

  • Add logging and alert notifications (email / Telegram)
  • Write a threat model document for the tool
  • Package it with Docker for safe lab testing

8. Viva / Review Questions

Common questions examiners ask for projects in this domain.

  1. Which threat or attack does this project defend against?
  2. What detection or protection technique is used and what are its limits?
  3. How are false positives and false negatives handled?
  4. Which cryptographic algorithms or security standards are involved?
  5. What legal and ethical rules apply when testing a tool like this?

9. Source Code & License

This project is developed by cloudflare and published on GitHub under the BSD 3-Clause "New" or "Revised" License. Please follow the license terms and credit the original author when you use or modify this code.

View Source on GitHubDownload ZIP

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