I would understand self hosting but those are for-profit entities as well. They might be subject to less regulatory oversight because they’re smaller. They might not have as many resources to keep my data safe. They have benefits for sure but trust is not this easy to judge.
The difference is their business model is privacy. Google’s business model is advertising. I’m Proton’s customer, but advertisers are Google’s customers.
Sure, but they also don’t really have a business interest in keeping your passwords safe. If they have a breach, you either move your passwords or you don’t, they don’t see a financial hit. If Bitwarden or Proton have a breach, they lose paying customers to their competitors. They have to be better than their competitors to get your business, Google just bundles it with the rest of their stuff.
Also, Google is a massive target. They control the most popular browser, so there’s a ton of value in exploits. Bitwarden and Proton are competitively smaller, so the attacks are likely to be less sophisticated vs attacks against Chrome. The surface area of attack for a separate password manager is also quite small, so it’s comparatively easier to secure.
So yeah, that’s why I use something outside my browser. I use Bitwarden for my password manager (I intend to self-host it soon), and it works well.
The LastPass hack was caused by a Sr. DevOPs not practicing secure OPs at home (was running a very old version of Plex). It didn’t attack the technology stack itself, it attacked one of the employees. User passwords were encrypted, so attackers would need to break that encryption to access stored passwords.
You missed the Okta breach, which impacted support customers, but also didn’t expose stored passwords.
Bitwarden hasn’t been hacked, and the closest I’ve heard of is this security research, but that’s using a feature that’s disabled by default, requires using a keyboard shortcut, and doesn’t work on all sites anyway. Yet they patched very quickly anyway.
I personally trust Bitwarden. They have acted professionally at every turn, and I can self-host if I choose. I don’t trust LastPass or Okta (though I need to use Okta for work), and I don’t particularly trust 1password despite them not being breached because their product is not FOSS. Chrome is a big product with lots of breaches every day, so I’d really prefer to not have my passwords stored by the same software stack as a massive hacking target. Bitwarden has separate desktop apps, so I can completely separate my data if I so choose.
The real issue is that Google stores your passwords in plaintext. That’s why they survive a password reset, or apparently now can be shared with others. Proton and Bitwarden encrypt your passwords so that nobody but you can access them, or at least in the case of Bitwarden, you can share with other users using pre-shared keys.
Plaintext passwords was a fuckup that they self-reported 5 years ago and affected some business users. Most browsers don’t really encrypt locally stored passwords.
Based on prcinpipes Bitwarden is an obvious choice. With things like passwords I’m leaning into giving my keys to a company that, if it comes to be, can pay gargantuan ransoms.
Proton. Bitwarden
I would understand self hosting but those are for-profit entities as well. They might be subject to less regulatory oversight because they’re smaller. They might not have as many resources to keep my data safe. They have benefits for sure but trust is not this easy to judge.
The difference is their business model is privacy. Google’s business model is advertising. I’m Proton’s customer, but advertisers are Google’s customers.
I don’t trust them in general but I’m certain Google doesn’t use my passwords for advertising.
Sure, but they also don’t really have a business interest in keeping your passwords safe. If they have a breach, you either move your passwords or you don’t, they don’t see a financial hit. If Bitwarden or Proton have a breach, they lose paying customers to their competitors. They have to be better than their competitors to get your business, Google just bundles it with the rest of their stuff.
Also, Google is a massive target. They control the most popular browser, so there’s a ton of value in exploits. Bitwarden and Proton are competitively smaller, so the attacks are likely to be less sophisticated vs attacks against Chrome. The surface area of attack for a separate password manager is also quite small, so it’s comparatively easier to secure.
So yeah, that’s why I use something outside my browser. I use Bitwarden for my password manager (I intend to self-host it soon), and it works well.
So far big guys didn’t leak passwords but 1password and LastPass did.
1password did not get hacked.
The LastPass hack was caused by a Sr. DevOPs not practicing secure OPs at home (was running a very old version of Plex). It didn’t attack the technology stack itself, it attacked one of the employees. User passwords were encrypted, so attackers would need to break that encryption to access stored passwords.
You missed the Okta breach, which impacted support customers, but also didn’t expose stored passwords.
Bitwarden hasn’t been hacked, and the closest I’ve heard of is this security research, but that’s using a feature that’s disabled by default, requires using a keyboard shortcut, and doesn’t work on all sites anyway. Yet they patched very quickly anyway.
I personally trust Bitwarden. They have acted professionally at every turn, and I can self-host if I choose. I don’t trust LastPass or Okta (though I need to use Okta for work), and I don’t particularly trust 1password despite them not being breached because their product is not FOSS. Chrome is a big product with lots of breaches every day, so I’d really prefer to not have my passwords stored by the same software stack as a massive hacking target. Bitwarden has separate desktop apps, so I can completely separate my data if I so choose.
That’s a lot of words to confirm what I said.
Here are fewer words: 1password didn’t get hacked (you claimed they did), LastPass didn’t expose user passwords.
The real issue is that Google stores your passwords in plaintext. That’s why they survive a password reset, or apparently now can be shared with others. Proton and Bitwarden encrypt your passwords so that nobody but you can access them, or at least in the case of Bitwarden, you can share with other users using pre-shared keys.
Plaintext passwords was a fuckup that they self-reported 5 years ago and affected some business users. Most browsers don’t really encrypt locally stored passwords.
Between the for-profit businesses of Google and bitwarden, I’m going to trust bitwarden more.
Based on prcinpipes Bitwarden is an obvious choice. With things like passwords I’m leaning into giving my keys to a company that, if it comes to be, can pay gargantuan ransoms.