by: George Starcher, Associate Editor

Normally when you add passwords to your keychain you add them to your default keychain. This is your login keychain when you open the Keychain Access application.

I like to keep my more sensitive keys (passwords) on their own keychain. This prevents any running application from just yanking my most sensitive passwords from the usually unlocked login keychain.

To make your own, open the Keychain Access application. Click File-new Keychain. I recommend you let it create it in your default Library-Keychains subfolder under your home folder. That way anything you do to backup your home folder gets your extra keychain as well. Make sure to assign a good strong passphrase to the new keychain. Once you make the new keychain, right click or option-click the keychain in the list and edit the settings for that new keychain. I like to use the settings shown below so it gets sync’d to my dotMac account and locks after a very short period.

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