Linuxers posted a guide about using passwords securely with wget

Before the Wget 1.12 version, in order to fetch the authenticated http/ftp pages, we had to provide the password in clear text which was quite insecure. Since that version, a new option, --ask-password, has been included which prompts the user to fill the password in a secure manner(hidden like unix passwd).

  Wget Password: How to use passwords securely with wget