Are you storing any passwords in plaintext?

This question is asking whether your organization stores user passwords in their original, readable format (plaintext) rather than in a secure, encrypted form. Storing passwords in plaintext is considered a severe security vulnerability because if an unauthorized person gains access to your database or systems, they can immediately see and use all user passwords without any additional effort. This is particularly dangerous because many users reuse passwords across multiple services. In a security assessment, this question helps evaluate whether your organization follows basic security practices for credential management. Password storage is a fundamental security control that protects user credentials even if other security measures fail. The best practice is to never store passwords in plaintext. Instead, passwords should be stored using strong cryptographic hashing algorithms with salting (like bcrypt, Argon2, or PBKDF2). These methods convert passwords into irreversible hashed values, so even if your database is compromised, the actual passwords cannot be easily determined. When answering this question, be honest about your current practices. If you do store passwords in plaintext, acknowledge this as a security gap and outline your plans to remediate it. If you don't store plaintext passwords, briefly describe your password hashing approach to demonstrate security maturity.