To some degree, the *only* thing being offered is obscurity. Eventually, a password ends up being stored *somewhere*. Whether it is in the CGI, or behind the scenes in a 'proxy server', the password *is* available.
If somebody wants the password, they will eventually get it. I wish MySQL provided an authentication scheme based on some other sort of credentials than a password. The whole concept of a password is wrong when it comes to automated tasks.
In any case, I am merely warning that some commonly accepted security techniques are not security techniques at all, but rather, sophisticated evasive attempts at misdirection. How much effort is it worth, when the mere sophistication involved guarantees that the programmers who will maintain the system in the future understand it less, and may completely unintentionally violate the scheme in such a way as to make the system more open after than before.
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