4 ms·

Convenience. A self-hosted password manager really shouldn't be exposed to the internet. If you are making it accessible over the internet, it's a far greater

by YPPH 5y ago

Convenience. A self-hosted password manager really shouldn't be exposed to the internet. If you are making it accessible over the internet, it's a far greater security threat imo. You're just not going to be able to keep it up to the same security standards as a large production install, like what the Bitwarden folks have going. Needing to VPN or SSH tunnel into my home network each time I need a password is far too inconvenient. Not to mention the spared effort in not needing to regularly back up your vault or worrying about keeping the service available.

lisper 5y ago
If it's properly encrypted you should be able to publish it on github and still be more secure than entrusting it to a third party.
- YPPH 5y ago
  Publishing your vault of passwords on a public GitHub repository seems like a pretty bad idea, no matter how well you trust the client-side encryption code. I'm no expert on the subject, but I suspect these password managers use a sophisticated mechanism of authentication (for accessing the vault) as well as encrypting of the actual contents of the vault. The effect of this means that Bob's encrypted vault cannot be downloaded by an attacker without the attacker first authenticating to the server.
  - lisper 5y ago
    And why do you think that authentication + encryption is going to be more secure than encryption alone? Either way, there's a secret. If you know the secret you can access the data and if you don't you can't. The UI/UX trappings of the mechanism don't change this fundamental dynamic. What does change the dynamic is if you allow a third party to control the code that you run.
    - YPPH 5y ago
      2FA is engaged at the authentication stage, so knowing the vault passphrase may not be sufficient. Further, allowing anyone to download my encrypted vault just feels really uncomfortable and unnecessary.
      - lisper 5y ago
        You can use 2FA to encrypt. OK, it would be 2FE, not 2FA, but it's the same idea. Just encrypt using a Diffie-Helman key derived from a secret contained on a device. (Of course, if you're going to do this, you could just as well keep the vault itself on the device.) > Further, allowing anyone to download my encrypted vault just feels really uncomfortable and unnecessary. It is unnecessary. I said you could publish your vault on github and still be more secure than a third-party provider. I didn't say you should do this. Of course you should try to keep your vault away from prying eyes. But you should not rely on this for your security. You should only ever rely on one thing for data security, and that is the integrity of your secrets, which should be small enough to be stored in your brain or in a device that allows them to be used without being read (2FA/E). That's the whole point of encryption.
  - Barrin92 5y ago
    >Publishing your vault of passwords on a public GitHub repository seems like a pretty bad idea, no matter how well you trust the client-side encryption code. If it's properly encrypted you can display your encrypted vault on a Times Square billboard and it doesn't matter, it's like that physics experiment[1], looks scary but there's nothing unsafe about it. [1]https://youtu.be/xXXF2C-vrQE https://youtu.be/xXXF2C-vrQE
miked85 5y ago
That is why the local vault option was the best in my mind, and then using DropBox/Resilio/etc to sync. It is very unfortunate that they are no longer supporting local vaults in the next version.

by YPPH 5y ago

lisper 5y ago

If it's properly encrypted you should be able to publish it on github and still be more secure than entrusting it to a third party.

YPPH 5y ago
Publishing your vault of passwords on a public GitHub repository seems like a pretty bad idea, no matter how well you trust the client-side encryption code. I'm no expert on the subject, but I suspect these password managers use a sophisticated mechanism of authentication (for accessing the vault) as well as encrypting of the actual contents of the vault. The effect of this means that Bob's encrypted vault cannot be downloaded by an attacker without the attacker first authenticating to the server.
- lisper 5y ago
  And why do you think that authentication + encryption is going to be more secure than encryption alone? Either way, there's a secret. If you know the secret you can access the data and if you don't you can't. The UI/UX trappings of the mechanism don't change this fundamental dynamic. What does change the dynamic is if you allow a third party to control the code that you run.
  - YPPH 5y ago
    2FA is engaged at the authentication stage, so knowing the vault passphrase may not be sufficient. Further, allowing anyone to download my encrypted vault just feels really uncomfortable and unnecessary.
    - lisper 5y ago
      You can use 2FA to encrypt. OK, it would be 2FE, not 2FA, but it's the same idea. Just encrypt using a Diffie-Helman key derived from a secret contained on a device. (Of course, if you're going to do this, you could just as well keep the vault itself on the device.) > Further, allowing anyone to download my encrypted vault just feels really uncomfortable and unnecessary. It is unnecessary. I said you could publish your vault on github and still be more secure than a third-party provider. I didn't say you should do this. Of course you should try to keep your vault away from prying eyes. But you should not rely on this for your security. You should only ever rely on one thing for data security, and that is the integrity of your secrets, which should be small enough to be stored in your brain or in a device that allows them to be used without being read (2FA/E). That's the whole point of encryption.
- Barrin92 5y ago
  >Publishing your vault of passwords on a public GitHub repository seems like a pretty bad idea, no matter how well you trust the client-side encryption code. If it's properly encrypted you can display your encrypted vault on a Times Square billboard and it doesn't matter, it's like that physics experiment[1], looks scary but there's nothing unsafe about it. [1]https://youtu.be/xXXF2C-vrQE https://youtu.be/xXXF2C-vrQE

miked85 5y ago

That is why the local vault option was the best in my mind, and then using DropBox/Resilio/etc to sync. It is very unfortunate that they are no longer supporting local vaults in the next version.