For example, one day a malicious maintainer could flip a switch that simply updates the docker image to send thousands of peoples’ entire vault somewhere and then disappear, no?
Edit: Noting that there have been discussions about the default number of iterations. https://github.com/bitwarden/jslib/issues/52
You can patch the bitwarden client (and also take the opportunity to remove the spyware they have embedded in it, as well), or use a program like LuLu or Little Snitch to block it from communicating with anything but your own selfhosted bitwarden_rs instance.
EDIT: Never mind, found it - https://github.com/bitwarden/desktop/issues/552. This isn't exactly an RCE. You can say the same about anything. By your logic Microsoft auto-updates are RCE. Same with pacman/apt-get/yum package managers. Same with pretty much anything else.
I'm not saying they're not valid concerns, however, if you're this worried about all of these things, maybe cloud-based software isn't for you.
1) if you worry about people replacing the docker image you are using, build your own. It's not hard. Alternatively, use a specific version of the docker image by specifying the version or the hash (if you are really paranoid). Of course after you review the Dockerfile. Minimum at least glance through the Dockerfile.
2) bitwarden has import/export functionality (client side) so if your server disappears for whatever reason, you can still export your passwords from the client side.
3) if you don't trust the OSS code, audit it or at least look through it. That's the whole point of OSS. Build it from source if you must. File bugs. Look at the issue tracker. You can choose not to but if something happens it's your problem; not somebody else's problem.
4) The vault is encrypted and the server never handles or sees the decrypted content (see 3 to verify this). Other people's ability to break that encryption depends on you using a secure master password.
5) Or just pay Bitwarden to host passwords for you and rely on their terms of use, SLAs, support, good reputation, and what not. That's probably the best option if you want ass coverage for professional usage. Their pricing is very reasonable for small setups. And probably sharing passwords with a large group of users is just a spectacularly bad idea to begin with. A couple of key users, should cost you max 20/month. Not really worth dedicating devops time for self hosting unless you have a really good reason to. If you do, see 1-4.
Thats an outright fantasy, every day I rely on like 50 pieces of software written in 20 different languages and frameworks. They are updated multiple times a month. How many man hours would it take? 1000 a week?
Proffesional developers couldn't find heartbleed for years, you really think anyone would notice a hidden backdoor in software like this withing a year?
Most people choose to trust certain software providers based on their reputation. But if you have serious doubts and you don't check, that would be your problem.
Whining about an open source project maybe being insecure basically means either check it or don't use it. Nobody is twisting your arm to risk your passwords on some wonky self hosted setup. Your problem if it blows up in your face. That's also what it spells out in a typical OSS license (that would be the section talking about limited liability). That's another thing people tend to not check that they probably should pay some attention to. Using the software means accepting that it's your responsibility.
If like most you are unable to make a sound judgment on this front; consider paying a service provider providing you a service. That would be Bitwarden in this case. They kindly provide a free version even. Easy choice IMHO.
Heart-bleed slipped through the cracks for a while and then certain software providers lived up to their reputation by providing fixes in a timely fashion. And certain others messed up by not doing that. I care more about how developers act when something like this happens than the fact that it happens.
OSS software providers are no different than other providers when it comes to trust. Except you have the option of looking at their code. Lots of people doing that builds trust. I tend to look at things like number of stars, commit frequency, and other things when deciding to use a random Github thing. When it comes to software that is safety critical, I prefer the scrutiny of an active community of developers. That just increases my level of trust.
IMHO Bitwarden's trustworthiness just went up by virtue of there being multiple implementations of the thing and apparently a growing community of users and developers depending on these things. I'm already using it and vastly prefer this over some closed source solution with opaque development processes. I probably would not self host but it is nice to have that option available.
It is a choice to obey the law of gravity? Because Its physically impossible for one person to check all security critical code they come in contact with even if they know every single programming language and have a Phd in cryptography. So stop with the accusatory language about 'whining' and pontification about choice.
Unless you review the source code of everything you use, and compile it yourself, there’s always that risk.
What prevents Postgres mainteners to just still all your DB ? Nginx mainteners to redirect your web traffic ?
Ultimately, it boils down to a balance between trust in the author, the community or your own checking process.
Also this is only a risk if you use the provided Web vault. If you use the desktop, mobile or browser extension clients, it would require both Bitwarden LLC and dani garcia to conspire against you as the server doesn't control code those clients run and the API only provides it data in encrypted format.
Finally, if you're that worried you can pin the container version by hash and only update when you are confident in the new version
And all of the above are very good plausible deniability excuses, such that this single developer could, after all, be malicious and still not loose his reputation simply by claiming he got targeted by a 3rd party.
Let that sink in: a single developer and their PC is a gatekeeper of everyone's safety.
...or they have to do it because of the NSA and weirdly 99% of users don't care or don't have the means to do anything about it.
Companies aren't trustworthy, they are bigger targets but also targets with thicker armor.
I just go with the offline route, KeepassXC runs well enough for me and is compatible with phones. I need to handle data sync myself but it's not like I change or add new passwords every day.
It's not fair to single out just Bitwarden IMO.
The real threat is that someone takes control of the bitwarden browser extension and pushes a malicious update.
That's why I don't use any KeePass extensions. I just don't trust browser enough to be able to get any of my passwords.
I'm thinking about writing my own extension which will communicate with KeePass in a way that suits me (basically: when I'm pressing button in browser, it'll popup KeePass window with search field filled with server domain. Then I can either auto-type password from KeePass or copy it to clipboard, either way I'm only using KeePass and browser extension have no way to get any information.
I'd absolutely use KeePass for a long term storage password vault (with appropriately obscure reminders so I could recall the password), but the ecosystem of many unofficial free implementations for integration into browsers, phones (IIRC), etc. makes me twitch.
Then when you log into somewhere add another secret (which you keep in your head) to the end of the password you stored in Bitwarden.
Switch on 2FA everywhere you can.
Sleep at night.
Instead of a salt, which is random for each entry and has to be stored along the hash, one single pepper is added to each password before hashing and kept secret.