cross-posted from: https://thelemmy.club/post/57178743

RyanL Bitwarden Employee

Hello everyone!

Starting in the next release, the Bitwarden apps published to the various stores will be the commercially licensed builds. No action is needed, and the apps will work exactly as they do today.

Bitwarden remains committed to open source security and transparency
The GPLv3 OSS licensed version continues to be updated and published on GitHub
All current features are available in both versions
License details are on GitHub
Bitwarden remains committed to a robust, free forever plan for everyone

If you have any questions, please ask them in this thread. Thanks all!

EDIT:

Bitwarden is not going closed-source
You can still fork Bitwarden
No change to self-hosting, the licensing change affects those who are repackaging and reselling Bitwarden
The free plan is here to stay permanently
    • giant_smeeg@feddit.uk
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      3
      ·
      1 month ago

      Don’t even know where i’d switch.

      Proton -> I already use Proton suite and I like the seperation, the 2 password option doesn’t work for me either. I just need a seperate password.

      Keepass -> I use quite a few devices and the sync just seems like a nightmare…

      Any other options? For now i’ll stick as BW is still great but will start exploring others.

          • rumba@lemmy.zip
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            1 month ago

            A little more than a year ago, Syncthing for Android had a lot of issues, there was a breaking change installed that required updates and the existing clients had issues, it has since been forked.

            If you don’t need the granular security or family-friendliness it should provide.

            • ImmortalColeSlaw@lemmy.today
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              1
              ·
              1 month ago

              Yes I want to say this was right before or during the chaos because I remember reading about the fork after I gave up lol

          • SepticModular@quokk.au
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            0
            ·
            1 month ago

            But thousands of people have it working just fine. Not calling you out but it does work very well. Did you follow a step by step guide? I know websearch makes it hard to learn new tech things these days.

            Just keep in mind, set up a default folder and file (filename.kdbx) to share on one device, add Remote Device (QR code helps there), go to Sharing Tab and select Default Folder. If the Default Folder isn’t ticked on both devices in the Sharing Tab on each, nothing happens. When you work it out, that folder can be called anything and you can get advanced with how or when it shares or which direction the data goes (think photo backup from mobile to desktop).

            New Android app to use is:

            https://github.com/chenxiaolong/BasicSync

            Use Obtainium- https://github.com/ImranR98/Obtainium - to install it and keep it updated. Obtainium can update itself the same way.

            Convoluted, I know, but so is relying on a company to host for you in the cloud. They just hide all the complexity behind the interface. With Syncthing, once it’s set up between all your devices (and there is a way to quickly auto accept setup once further advanced/knowledgeable), it just chugs along in the background. Changes to keepass file appear almost instantly across each device once it’s opened.

            • ImmortalColeSlaw@lemmy.today
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              0
              ·
              1 month ago

              I’m probably going to try it again in the near future and hopefully it’s better than it was. Saving your comment, thank you.

  • ture@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    26
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    1 month ago

    That’s quite the disappointment. Probably need to prepare to switch away from bitwarden or at least research options for open source clients for my vaultwarden backend.

    • superglue@lemmy.dbzer0.com
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      19
      ·
      1 month ago

      Someone can correct me, but this change seems to be targeting people who are repackaging bitwarden and selling it. It does feel like we are trending the wrong direction though.

      • ture@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        11
        ·
        1 month ago

        If you read their announcement carefully you’ll find things like

        All current features are available in both versions
        

        Which strongly implies that the different versions will start to diverge over time. Then at one point they will just be like maah it’s not worth putting more work into the open source thing, we’ll focus on building new cool features yada yada yada. And this is how all the open to partly open to closed source rug pulls worked in the last years.

        (If you want to do this the worst way possible like MinIO you also squash / delete the Git history the moment you announce you’re only working on closed source)

      • ture@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        1 month ago

        Before Bitwarden / Vaultwarden I went with Keepass (it was some fork don’t remember the exact name KeepassXC probably) synced via Nextcloud. It’s not as convenient as Bitwarden plus at least back then it didn’t support passkeys. So yeah, I don’t know what is actually out there. Honestly I don’t think it’s super urgent to start hunting for alternatives but probably we should have at least some ideas in case the Bitwarden team does some weird moves.

  • dmtalon@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    10
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    1 month ago

    Sigh… I hope this isn’t the first move of enshitifying bitwarden. I read the comments/replies and hope this is benign but I’m now nervous

    • Mike Wooskey@lemmy.thewooskeys.com
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      15
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      1 month ago

      I think it is the next move (not the first) in enshittifying bitwarden. I think the first move was the leadership change announced in May.

    • scytale@piefed.zip
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      11
      ·
      1 month ago

      The first move was when they hired a CEO who comes from private equity. This is the second move.

  • woelkchen@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    7
    ·
    1 month ago

    App store EULAs and GPLv3 frequently clash. This change only affects the app store binary releases.

  • E_coli42@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    7
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    1 month ago

    I have a proton membership anyways so proton pass seems good since they have SimpleLogin

  • Foni@piefed.zip
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    7
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    1 month ago

    What would be the reason for using this and not Keepass from the beginning?

    • dmtalon@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      12
      ·
      1 month ago

      Well, a big reason I ended up with bitwarden is being able to have a family group that I can help foster, encourage, force my family to use a password manager by having/showing them how these work , why they should use them and continually point them to the app to save and/or retrieve passwords.

      The barrier to entry for non technical users is much lower. I don’t want to manage making sure everyone’s db is safe/synced etc… either

      • Foni@piefed.zip
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        1
        ·
        1 month ago

        I don’t know, my wife (0 technical knowledge) works perfectly, with daughter and personal databases. Of course, it’s true that I set everything up myself and I make sure the database is on the family NAS. I’m not judging you or anything, but while it’s true that setting it up is a bit more difficult, using it, in my opinion, is not at all.

      • mbirth 🇬🇧@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        1 month ago

        I’m using Strongbox on macOS and iOS. Uses a KeePass2 database in the background, does TOTP (so does KeePassXC), syncs via iCloud (but also supports SFTP, WebDAV, OneDrive, Google Drive, and Dropbox) and also keeps my Passkeys. And it supports Apple’s AutoFill API, so it works in basically any input field across the systems and feels “native”. No browser extensions (at least for Safari) needed.

        And if it goes rogue, I can switch to e.g. KeePassium or any other KeePass-compatible app.

      • Foni@piefed.zip
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        1 month ago

        I might be a bit paranoid (or an idiot) but I think having the password and the totp in the same database (and app) somewhat negates the point of two-factor authentication.

  • AppleMango@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    6
    ·
    1 month ago

    I think all of us can just using Vaultwarden, it seems to fix all the problems that are there even in the old free version of Bitwarden.

  • Rose@slrpnk.net
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    1 month ago

    When Bitwarden got a meh “refresh” of the user interface and started vibe coding stuff (I’m not some super hard-line anti-AI person, but dammit, you absolutely should not vibe code security-critical apps), I switched to KeePassX. It was like coming back home! I used to use KeePass and KeePass 2, switched to Bitwarden for a long while, and while it was neat, KeePassX is just neater. (Doesn’t have cloud sync, but syncing the vault files with LocalSend is easy enough.)

  • Guanlin@lemmy.dbzer0.com
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    1 month ago

    Pretty much seen it coming when the new CEO came in and removed the words “Transparency” and “Always Free” from the official marketing.

    • Zagorath@quokk.au
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      1 month ago

      Whether you believe it or not is another matter, but this very post still includes the words “transparency” and “always free”.

      Bitwarden remains committed to open source security and transparency

      Bitwarden remains committed to a robust, free forever plan for everyone

      and a bonus:

      The free plan is here to stay permanently

  • NGC2346@sh.itjust.works
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    1 month ago

    If you are on Lemmy, theres very high probability that you also have the technical abilities required to self host Vaultwarden and stop relying on a greedy company for your most critical aspect.

    • 1984@lemmy.today
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      1 month ago

      I could but I don’t want. Self hosting something this important? I can’t login to any website without this software, including my email. It’s super critical.

      • krysel@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        0
        ·
        1 month ago

        The vault gets synced to your devices. So even if your Backend goes down you dont lose access to your passwords in an instant

              • potustheplant@feddit.nl
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                0
                ·
                1 month ago

                Maybe that’s a bitwarden issue, I guess. One more point for selfhosting. Also, even if that were to happen to you, you most likely have it installed in more than one device. The chances of all sessions logging out at the same time would be extremely low.

                • WhyJiffie@sh.itjust.works
                  link
                  fedilink
                  English
                  arrow-up
                  0
                  ·
                  1 month ago

                  The chances of all sessions logging out at the same time would be extremely low.

                  not all devices, but multiple of them did log out roughly the same time. so, don’t rely on storing the 2FA authenticator app’s password in it.