Account Management Statements Sets the account authentication plugin to  auth_plugin , clears the credentials to the empty string (the credentials are associated with the old authentication plugin, not the new one), and stores the result in the account row in the  mysql.user  system table. In addition, the password is marked expired. The user must choose a new one when next connecting. Sets the account authentication plugin to  auth_plugin , passes the cleartext  ’ auth_string ’  value to the plugin for possible hashing, and stores the result in the account row in the  mysql.user  system table. The  REPLACE  clause, if given, specifies the account current password, as described previously in this section. The  RETAIN CURRENT PASSWORD  clause, if given, causes the account current password to be retained as its secondary password, as described previously in this section. Sets the account authentication plugin to  auth_plugin , generates a random password, passes the cleartext password value to the plugin for possible hashing, and stores the result in the account row in the  mysql.user  system table. The statement also returns the cleartext password in a result set to make it available to the user or application executing the statement. For details about the result set and characteristics of randomly generated passwords, see Random Password Generation. The  REPLACE  clause, if given, specifies the account current password, as described previously in this section. The  RETAIN CURRENT PASSWORD  clause, if given, causes the account current password to be retained as its secondary password, as described previously in this section. Sets the account authentication plugin to  auth_plugin  and stores the  ’ auth_string ’  value as is in the  mysql.user  account row. If the plugin requires a hashed string, the string is assumed to be already hashed in the format the plugin requires. Discards the account secondary password, if there is one, as described previously in this section. Example: Specify the password as cleartext; the default plugin is used: ALTER USER ’jeffrey’@’localhost’ IDENTIFIED BY ’ password ’; ALTER USER ’jeffrey’@’localhost’ IDENTIFIED WITH mysql_native_password BY ’ password ’; Example: Specify the authentication plugin, along with a cleartext password value: Example: Like the preceding example, but in addition, specify the current password as a cleartext value to satisfy any account requirement that the user making the change knows that password: 2842 • IDENTIFIED WITH  auth_plugin  BY ’ auth_string ’ [REPLACE ’ current_auth_string ’] [RETAIN CURRENT PASSWORD] • IDENTIFIED WITH  auth_plugin  BY RANDOM PASSWORD [REPLACE ’ current_auth_string ’] [RETAIN CURRENT PASSWORD] • IDENTIFIED WITH  auth_plugin  AS ’ auth_string ’ • DISCARD OLD PASSWORD