# Why is Safari continually asking for a keychain password? and how do I turn it off?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-safari-continually-asking-for-a-keychain-password-and-how-do-i-turn-it-off/556586>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [October 9, 2010, 7:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-safari-continually-asking-for-a-keychain-password-and-how-do-i-turn-it-off/556586 "2010-10-09T07:28:09Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\
**Post date:** [October 9, 2010, 7:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-safari-continually-asking-for-a-keychain-password-and-how-do-i-turn-it-off/556586/1 "2010-10-09T07:28:09Z")

</div>

I took my Mac in to be de-partitioned. It’s back from the shop, and now Safari is continually asking me for a keychain password. I don’t know what the password is, so I keep clicking cancel, and it goes away. But how do I stop it from popping up all the time? it’s very annoying.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![kbear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4491bb/32.png) [@kbear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kbear)\
**Post date:** [October 9, 2010, 8:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-safari-continually-asking-for-a-keychain-password-and-how-do-i-turn-it-off/556586/2 "2010-10-09T08:35:52Z")

</div>

Drives you nuts doesn’t it? I’ve got the same problem with my daughter’s computer. I changed her log in password for her, forgetting that it messes up the keychain. I keep forgetting how to fix it.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![JoeH2O](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/9de053/32.png) [@JoeH2O](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JoeH2O)\
**Post date:** [October 9, 2010, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-safari-continually-asking-for-a-keychain-password-and-how-do-i-turn-it-off/556586/3 "2010-10-09T14:39:45Z")

</div>

You can do keychain first aid (Applications \> Utilities \> Keychain Access, then [option+command+A] or pick it from the first menu) but that may not fix it. If you have forgotten the original login password then you will be stuck unlocking the keychain since it is set to the same thing. When you change the login password using the master utility on the OS X install disk, or via another admin account, the keychain pass does not change.

If you know the old password you can set it to be the same as the new login password, or you can just nuke the old keychain and start again with a new one, but you will lose all of your saved entries, obviously.