Yo, I feel you on the security concerns with curl and username/password. One thing I do is use a config file for curl. You can create a `.curlrc` file and store your credentials there.
Example:
```bash
user = "username:password"
```
Then just run `curl https://api.example.com` and it’ll pick up the credentials from the config file.
Example:
```bash
user = "username:password"
```
Then just run `curl https://api.example.com` and it’ll pick up the credentials from the config file.