Why does Chrome ask for my GNOME keyring (Seahorse) password?

Question

I use Google Chrome 12.0 (google-chrome-stable) and Seahorse on Ubuntu 10.10 (I know Seahorse is not the GNOME keyring, but it might be easier for others to search).

Always when I start Chrome I get a prompt for my keyring password. It seems like Chrome doesn't save anything in it. So, why does Chrome ask for the passoword?

Solution

Unfortunately, older versions of Chrome must unlock the keyring to be able to check if you've saved passwords for a particular site. This has been fixed in the current development version; Chrome will now only prompt to unlock your keyring if it actually needs to retrieve a password from it. If you don't want to use an unstable version of Chrome, you can work around the issue by passing the --password-store=basic option so that Chrome uses it's own password store rather than attempting to use the GNOME keyring.

For more information, see bug #85285 in the Chromium bug tracker.

Comments

[Admin]

Did you have CHrome to save your passwords as encrypted? I cannot simulate this on my system

[Admin]

I don't know. If Chrome asked me some time ago, I could have used this. Where can I check this?

[Mike]

I get prompted for my password to unlock the keyring every time Chrome starts, however even if I cancel it, my saved passwords are still available.

[Mayura]

Thank you for the solution, you are life saver :) My current command-line, if it helps anyone solving issue! nohup /usr/bin/google-chrome-beta --user-data-dir=/home/mayur/.config/google-chrome-beta --flag-switches-begin --enable-tcp-fastopen --enable-spelling-auto-correct --flag-switches-end --password-store=basic &

[Digger]

FYI, the problem outlined in the OP is still present in Chromium 37.0.2062.120 (in Debian 7 (Wheezy)). Thankfully, the workaround presented in this answer still works a treat!