- cross-posted to:
- cybersecurity@infosec.pub
- cross-posted to:
- cybersecurity@infosec.pub
- Millions of people use password managers. They make accessing online services and bank accounts easy and simplify credit card payments.
- Many providers promise absolute security – the data is said to be so encrypted that even the providers themselves cannot access it.
- However, researchers from ETH Zurich have shown that it is possible for hackers to view and even change passwords.
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tl;dr:
- If the password manager server is hacked and compromised, then syncing your passwords with the compromised server will lead to compromised passwords (duh)
- None of the providers tested have (or have had in the past) compromised servers.
and an observation or two:
- Vaultwarden is free, self-hostable, and doesn’t rely on trust in a third party.
- Keepass (and its client variants, like KeepassXC which is pretty great) is even more secure because there is no server, just an encrypted file you can store anywhere.
Keepass (and its client variants, like KeepassXC which is pretty great) is even more secure because there is no server, just an encrypted file you can store anywhere.
And simultaneously less secure because it’s up to you to handle keeping your vault synced between various devices and most people are significantly worse at keeping systems secure than the professionals at the password managers.
Self hosting a server of some kind or using something like Keepass on a single device (with offline backups) is the most secure option, but as usual with security doing so trades significant convenience for security. For most people who are uninterested in making sure their servers are kept up to date week to week letting professionals handle it is the better option.
I store my keypass database on several flash drives in different physical locations and update them several times per year to make sure that even if I do lose the copy I have, the versions on the flash drives, not at my physical location, are decently up to date, and so if I do lose any of the password data, it will be only for a couple of months worth if that.
If I add things that are extremely important, such as a new mortgage provider, or some sort of financial data into my keypass database, then I do an unscheduled immediate update to all of my flash drives in different physical locations to make sure that they all have that, but if it’s just a social media account, and I was to lose access to it, and not have the password for it, then… I wouldn’t be too upset about it.
In the absolute worst possible case, I stand to lose 3 months worth of data. It’s not often that I have to tweak stuff in my password manager, so that would be very few changes.
Great.
I am now your spouse and you want to give me access to the flash drive. What now?New requirement: I have several passwords I want to give you access to as well. What now?
As with everything: Your solution may work for yourself and a few others. The majority don’t want to collect 5 flash drives in different locations every 3 months to update a file (and making sure it’s the correct vault they have copied)
PThe master copy stays on my device. If I need to give somebody access to a specific password, I just give them that password locally and they put it in their password manager for that account.
Same thing occurs if they need to give me a password. They give me the password. I put it in my password manager and then I’m the one who updates the flash drives on the rotating basis like I mentioned above.
Great.
Now your data is (potentially) exactly where you are trying to keep it out of.So you made it more cumbersome to yourself by keeping your data as local as possible, yet still chosing to give up the tiny sliver of additional security for the comfort of others.
I don’t want to be annoying. But I hope you see what I am trying to convey.
OMFG can people please fucking go away with this stupid “password managers are worthless” bullshit today. They are exactly as secure as promised, unless you went to the obviously shady ones that use web interfaces. People have been saying this for years, if you want security, keep your password manager offline.
So by that logic BitWarden is unsafe?
Yes, if you arent self hosting the web interface or using the desktop client.
But these issues were patched before even publishing the findings, right?
There is no way to patch the inherent flaw that comes with delivering client software through a web browser. If the entire client is delivered as a web page from a server you dont control, then that server can modify the software however it pleases. Same applies to e2ee encrypted chat clients that run as a web page like element-web (browser based matrix client).
This comment shows that you know less about computers, than you may think. You can definetly make end to end encryption work using a Website. JavaScript runs client side. So as long as you trust the encryption algorithm (which in elements case you definetly can, because it is OSS), the encryption is safe and your unencrypted data never leaves the device.
The point is you are trusting the JavaScript that the server delivered to you. If the server is compromised, it hands you compromised JavaScript and you’re screwed. It’s the exact same thing as going to evil.com and entering your master password. I think that you inherently understand that evil.com is untrusted. However, if passwordmanager.com is compromised by the same people who own evil.com. there’s really no difference.
I understand, but wouldn’t the same problem occur, if the server for the website you download your software from or the server for your package manager would be compromised? Even if you would buy your software physically on a CD, there would be a chance someone has messed with the content on a CD.
So I don’t really see this as a flaw unique to browsers. Am I wrong?
