[HN Gopher] Tell HN: Bitwarden does not export attachments in ba...
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       Tell HN: Bitwarden does not export attachments in backups
        
       I've been using Bitwarden for about 4 years now and cannot
       understand how a Password Manager does not export attachments when
       backing up your data. I understand this was the case when the only
       export format was a CSV file, but now with JSON files I can't get
       my head around the fact that I almost missed crucial SSH keys had I
       not checked the output. A simple solution would be to b64 encode
       each file and add it into an array!  It's even mentioned on their
       Help page - https://bitwarden.com/help/export-your-data/ but I
       still think it's a bit unacceptable that there isn't even a warning
       in the GUI about this.  And yes, I know there are ways to manually
       export the files, but I shouldn't have to do that.
        
       Author : howlett
       Score  : 215 points
       Date   : 2022-06-11 07:07 UTC (15 hours ago)
        
       | culpable_pickle wrote:
       | Honestly, with 1Password's cloud only move, I firmly think
       | there's a open position for a new major player in the password
       | management space that learns from all the current players.
        
       | ancientsofmumu wrote:
       | Quick note, the Secure Note field can store up to 10k characters
       | (I think it is, last I looked) _post-encryption_ - that 's
       | typically big enough for most SSH key types, but may not be big
       | enough for some GPG key exports - I have one GPG key armor export
       | too large to fit. Point being you can stuff a good amount of info
       | in those Notes most times to get exported, but there is a limit
       | to be aware of - the client should fail to save the data once
       | you've crossed that limit if I recall correctly, red error text
       | etc.
        
       | Hellion wrote:
       | I'm still on KeePass. I keep meaning to get off of it but it more
       | or less works okay (not great)
       | 
       | I use windows, Debian, iOS, and Firefox as the browser on
       | desktop. Any recommendations?
        
         | sir_brickalot wrote:
         | an underappreciated feature in Keepass are URL overrides so you
         | can autorun RDP sessions, SSH sessions, SFTP sessions in other
         | apps with filled in credentials. If Bitwarden had this feature,
         | I'd probably switch.
        
         | clircle wrote:
         | Keepassxc plus the browser extension? Also, if it aint broke...
        
         | vbezhenar wrote:
         | I switched to iCloud passwords. It's terrible, but it works.
         | When I'm not on iOS/macOS, I'm typing passwords manually
         | looking at my phone. Not the best UX for sure.
        
       | adrianmonk wrote:
       | I don't use Bitwarden, but I just read the docs about backups,
       | which are here:
       | 
       | https://bitwarden.com/help/backup-on-premise/
       | 
       | Those say that the procedure for backups is to keep a copy of the
       | entire bwdata directory. It doesn't say that you can or should
       | use the export feature.
       | 
       | It seems like the export feature is meant for data migration, not
       | for backups. Though they are related, they're not the same
       | concept.
       | 
       | It probably wouldn't hurt to make this clearer in the GUI. In the
       | export section, it could warn not to use it for backups and could
       | give a link to the proper procedure.
        
       | ruffrey wrote:
       | It's worth taking a glance at other E2EE apps. I'm biased but
       | EnvKey can handle huge content, though file support is in early
       | stages.
        
       | hammyhavoc wrote:
       | Wow, if true, this is a huge oversight.
        
         | onetom wrote:
         | It's not something which you simply forget to think about.
         | There must be a lot of features, which are more important, as
         | in being requested for.
        
           | hammyhavoc wrote:
           | I must have been forgetting since I started using it over a
           | year ago. The software itself doesn't warn about this quirk.
        
       | leetrout wrote:
       | I went to bitwarden from dashlane that didnt even export secure
       | notes
       | 
       | https://www.reddit.com/r/Dashlane/comments/gfwyvo/comment/fq...
       | 
       | This is the same thing again.
       | 
       | I switched to 1password before all the funding and feel like
       | there arent any viable alternatives now.
       | 
       | Edit: to be clear this isnt me on reddit this thread is just what
       | backed up bitwarden.
        
         | fossuser wrote:
         | 1Password remains really great imo - people seem to use worse
         | alternatives for ideological reasons but I don't think there
         | are any that are actually better.
        
           | x3n0ph3n3 wrote:
           | I ditched it when they broke the ability to sync to the local
           | file system. Before that, I was using syncthing to share my
           | passwords between devices.
        
           | zeroonetwothree wrote:
           | How is it better than BitWarden? I've used both and they both
           | seem fine but I didn't see an obvious reason to prefer it. BW
           | is a lot cheaper as well.
        
             | mdaniel wrote:
             | My experience is that 1P has a lot more polish and
             | consideration for the user (err, I mean before the "8"
             | debacle). I cannot recall a single time I have lost an
             | autogenerated password, whereas with BW it happened about
             | 50% of the time. Filling up my vault with hundreds of
             | unnecessary password captures is better than losing a
             | single one, because _they_ don 't know how important any
             | one password is in order to gauge how "oops, sorrreeee, our
             | bad" affects the user
             | 
             | https://github.com/bitwarden/clients/issues/1620 (open
             | since _Feb 2021_ )
             | 
             | Aside from that, 1P has a ton more item types, which if one
             | thinks about a password manager as a key-value store, maybe
             | that's not interesting, but for me it's been really great
             | having passport details in a specific spot, without having
             | to invent my own taxonomy for squeezing passport details
             | into key-value pairs
             | 
             | Speaking of taxonomy, BW's lack of tagging is a dealbreaker
             | for me. Why in the world do I have to pick just one
             | "folder" for an item to live in: it can be "work" *and*
             | "aws" *and* "testing" allowing me to see all work, all aws,
             | all testing items grouped together
             | 
             | I do hate the new 1P api-only approach, but I'm not going
             | to jump ship just yet because the competition is not yet
             | better for my needs
        
               | j1elo wrote:
               | > _bitwarden /clients/issues/1620 (open since Feb 2021)_
               | 
               | Oh, try with something much worse, and _open since Dec
               | 2017_ (no, migrating to a new place is no excuse at all
               | to mark the issue as magically resolved)
               | 
               | https://github.com/bitwarden/clients/issues/443
               | 
               | Here I made a pretty clear video of the issue:
               | 
               | https://community.bitwarden.com/t/persistent-bitwarden-
               | ui-an...
               | 
               | Did anyone care? Not that I know of. It's 2022, so that's
               | been 5 years now.
               | 
               | I'll keep paying the pro account as long as it keeps
               | working _for me_ , but it saddens me that we still don't
               | have a universally good and free service that can be
               | recommended to lots of non-techies that are still stuck
               | on the old customs of reusing passwords.
        
               | dividedbyzero wrote:
               | What's the issue with 1Password 8? Upgraded today to get
               | the SSH agent and so far it seems alright.
        
               | mdaniel wrote:
               | It's partially teething pains as they _reimplement the
               | world_ in Electron, and partially  "sour grapes" since
               | that transition was coscheduled with the "and no more
               | local vaults, too bad"
               | 
               | Their QR code scanner went poof, in favor of "take a
               | screenshot to the clipboard," and it no longer is able to
               | suggest based on the "bundle ID" of the native apps. I
               | dunno if it ever did that for Windows, and of course
               | Linux support is brand new, but annoying for my case
               | nonetheless
        
       | snickerbockers wrote:
       | What exactly is an "attachment" in this context? Ive been using
       | BW for about a year now but I've never come across that term. Is
       | it non-login data like the secure notes section?
        
         | tut-urut-utut wrote:
         | Paid version allows you to store files.
        
       | webdog wrote:
       | This is very salient, I just left some feedback related to lack
       | of functionality, in their community forums yesterday. I bought a
       | subscription to use Bitwarden against 1Password, trying to switch
       | from 1P to BW. I dislike 1P's arrogant customer service (Read
       | their community forums for about an hour, and look at many of the
       | responses from staff regarding feature requests) and my attitude
       | towards them really soured when they flipped the switch on
       | perpetual licensing.
       | 
       | So I was excited and went in with an open mind, and delighted to
       | be supporting an open source company:
       | 
       | * The initial migration went off to a bad start as it didn't
       | include everything from 1Password. Seemingly random data, and
       | some attachments were missing. If I remember correctly,
       | timestamps/creation dates didn't seem to migrate over, and some
       | whole passwords weren't brought over, but no errors were reported
       | from their migrator.
       | 
       | * When I went to setup my vault after the migration, I was
       | disappointed to see that there was a distinct lack of password
       | types. I have software licenses, credit cards, API keys, regular
       | passwords, recovery tokens, (non-critical) GPG keys, SSH keys,
       | etc etc that I store in my vault. BW only had/has 4 item types to
       | choose from, which just isn't suitable if you want to correctly
       | track the types of items for organization and filtering. There is
       | support for custom fields, but it just isn't the same..
       | 
       | * No support for tagging. I tried to setup a nested folder
       | structure alternatively, but the UX was not easy to use in the
       | desktop application (I was assuming I could do something similar
       | to a `mkdir -p path/to/nested/folder` but BW only allowed me to
       | create a single folder item at a time. For 500 password items,
       | and different "buckets" I keep to organize, I ended up abandoning
       | folders and just kept everything in the root in a mish-mash
       | setup.
       | 
       | I get that it's small and open source, and you have to temper
       | expectations when comparing David (BW) vs Goliath (1P), but BW
       | seems to have earned more community trust, and has an engaged
       | community of fans. BW could absolutely provide a better
       | experience than 1P both from a customer empathy standpoint, and
       | from a product delivery perspective. But point 2 makes a failure
       | (IMO) on point 1. Reading through their community forums, many of
       | these (What I'd consider) table-stakes features have been left to
       | rot on the tree of technical debt. Which makes me sad, because
       | I'd pay a lot more than their current pricing model if they kept
       | an open source attitude towards the product and could deliver
       | more than just a "We're working on it! Stay tuned!" attitude
       | after years of community comments. I'm gonna stick with 1P when
       | the licenses come up for renewal, and use KeePass or Vault as an
       | on-prem backup solution.
       | 
       | I truly, truly hope BW succeeds, because I'd love to move away
       | from my current setup. But I'm not willing to capitulate my
       | workflow because the company can't deliver on highly-
       | requested/highly-coveted features.
       | 
       | I don't squarely put the blame on BW. This feels very common in
       | the saas lifecycle: A feature has some sort of engagement/revenue
       | metric attached to it, for growth tracking. Whether correlation
       | is correct is a debate for another time, but many of these core
       | features have an opaque effect on revenue or engagement (If
       | you're a cynical product manager, an efficient tagging system
       | correlates to less engagement, because I'm spending less time
       | rooting around the user interface, which is less opportunity to
       | use the application minute-by-minute), or it's considered
       | plumbing-type work in which the revenue/engagement potential is
       | spread out across the entire userbase, so the effect is less
       | explosive (SSH key management[1], a niche feature requested by a
       | loud subset of 1P users had huge awareness. But external sharing
       | of items[2] was something I heard very little about, even though
       | (objectively) external sharing casts a wider a shadow of net-new
       | 1P users.
       | 
       | I digress. This just reminded me of the frustration I have with
       | software: Feels like everything I want to use is always missing
       | some key element that I have to trade off for another key element
       | when looking at competitors.
       | 
       | [1] https://blog.1password.com/1password-ssh-agent/ [2]
       | https://blog.1password.com/psst-item-sharing/
        
         | jiveturkey wrote:
         | Those 3 points are valid but not even the worst bits. It sounds
         | like you are just griping about the switching cost issues, and
         | didn't get much further than initial setup.
         | 
         | Once you actually try to use BW in earnest, you'll find it's
         | noticeably worse than 1PW in most ways. The most glaring is
         | that it is meh at detecting login forms and poor at detecting
         | new account signup. These are the 2 primary flows for a pw
         | manager! It's unforgivable. Other flaws aside, 1PW puts
         | significant effort there and it shows.
         | 
         | > I truly, truly hope BW succeeds,
         | 
         | They've had quite long enough time already to do that. How long
         | will you hold out hope?
         | 
         | I want to love BW so much. I never could get myself to look at
         | KeePass. Anyway the primary use case I care about is sharing,
         | not self-mgmt.
        
           | TingPing wrote:
           | I've used BW for years and have never had issues detecting
           | forms.
        
       | anthropodie wrote:
       | I have Bitwarden desktop/mobile apps and I keep them in sync
       | exactly for this reason. In case something bad happens I can at
       | least copy and paste individual password!
        
       | quyleanh wrote:
       | This is one of my motivation to selfhosted Vaultwarden [0]. Full
       | features, lightweight with Rust, privacy, and full control.
       | 
       | [0] https://github.com/dani-garcia/vaultwarden
        
         | simplyfantash wrote:
         | I hope it wasn't really one of your motivations, because
         | Vaultwarden implements the server API. The lack of attachment
         | backup occurs at the Bitwarden client level.
        
           | ajb wrote:
           | Yes, but if you're running your own server you can back up
           | the server, you don't need to export.
        
           | Hellion wrote:
           | If you Control the server, you can certainly control backups
           | at a root level
        
             | Skunkleton wrote:
             | I really hope not. Why would the server have the keys
             | needed to decrypt the vault?
        
               | BrandoElFollito wrote:
               | It does not.
               | 
               | I actually wanted that functionality for my own
               | installation but it was rejected.
        
       | 1una wrote:
       | > A simple solution would be to b64 encode each file and add it
       | into an array!
       | 
       | An individual file attachment can be as large as 500 MB[0]. It
       | would make the JSON file too big to use.
       | 
       | Still, I do think that Bitwarden should warn users about it when
       | exporting. Just mentioning it in the _Help Center_ doesn 't seem
       | so helpful.
       | 
       | [0]: https://bitwarden.com/help/attachments/
        
         | ben0x539 wrote:
         | > An individual file attachment can be as large as 500 MB[0].
         | It would make the JSON file too big to use.
         | 
         | The backup would be too big to use if it included all the data
         | it's a backup of? What?
        
         | manmal wrote:
         | Why is such a JSON file too big to use if it's only ever
         | handled by streaming parsers? SQLite would be a better backup
         | format ofc.
        
           | mdaniel wrote:
           | Can you explain how sqlite is a better container for
           | arbitrary binary files than zip?
           | 
           | I mean, I know "INSERT INTO files ('my-file.bin',
           | X'CAFEBABE...')" gets it into sqlite, but how would a sane
           | person get that content back out?
        
             | onetom wrote:
             | Well, you can just get BLOBs out of an SQLite DB with
             | SELECT. Also: https://www.sqlite.org/fasterthanfs.html
             | 
             | Not that performance or file size would matter in this
             | case, BUT what using SQLite would allow is to use a single
             | format for persisting all aspects of the password database,
             | with immediate, programmatic, _random_ access to all
             | fields, including attachments.
             | 
             | But I also agree, that for this specific use-case, even
             | SQLite is a bit of an overkill probably.
             | 
             | Finally, there is always https://www.passwordstore.org/ :)
        
               | mdaniel wrote:
               | Right, but I feel we're having a miscommunication about
               | the level of effort one should expend to recover the
               | payloads; your mental model is that this:
               | sqlite3 -noheader -newline '' export.db "select data from
               | files where filename = 'my-file.bin'" > my-file.bin
               | 
               | is more user friendly than:                   unzip
               | 1PasswordExport-
               | ILESALYKVFDNJH3K24FEO3QRHM-20220611-100457.1pux files/my-
               | file.bin
        
           | vbezhenar wrote:
           | AFAIK SQLite field limit is 2 GB, so if you're used to
           | storing Blurays in your password database, that might be a
           | limiting factor as well.
        
             | weaksauce wrote:
             | the maximum file size is smaller than 500MB so that's a
             | moot point and not many people are going to be hitting that
             | size limit in the first place... it is a password manager
             | after all.
        
       | xanaxagoras wrote:
       | You should move to vaultwarden and do regular offsite backups
       | with one of the projects listed at the bottom here:
       | https://github.com/dani-garcia/vaultwarden/wiki/Backing-up-y...
       | 
       | This will backup your entire database, including attachments,
       | users, etc.
        
       | replwoacause wrote:
       | I've been using BW for 5 years but looks like I need to start the
       | search for a new PW manager. Thanks for pointing this out.
        
       | longrod wrote:
       | This makes a lot of sense. I use Notesnook [0] which also
       | encrypts everything client side. It also doesn't export
       | attachments in the automatic backups. I asked the devs and this
       | is done to save user's bandwidth and also to make everything more
       | reliable. Suppose the user's internet is slow or metered, what
       | should be done then? Would the backup never be taken? That's
       | obviously a bad idea since the notes are too important not to
       | backup.
       | 
       | So it makes a sacrifice on the attachments to make sure backup of
       | the more important stuff keeps working even when there's no
       | internet. Moreover downloading all the attachments takes a lot of
       | time and doing it every day (or whatever interval) wouldn't be a
       | good user experience.
       | 
       | I think the Notesnook guys were thinking of adding cloud-to-cloud
       | backups for attachments to work around this reliably.
       | 
       | [0] https://notesnook.com
        
         | nirvdrum wrote:
         | I'm not familiar with the tool, but naively I'd think offering
         | an "include attachments" checkbox would give the user control
         | over backup size. I know that might complicate the UI a bit and
         | maybe even confuse user by having the option, but expecting all
         | of your data to be backed up and only discovering that it isn't
         | after it's too late isn't stellar UX either.
        
       | aceazzameen wrote:
       | I recently switched from LastPass to Bitwarden, and LastPass has
       | the same issue. I had to manually save all my attachments and
       | upload them into their proper place on Bitwarden. It was
       | frustrating, but also not a big deal in my case. Worse things
       | have happened.
       | 
       | I wholeheartedly agree that these companies should have a warning
       | that attachments won't export. Because I almost forgot about
       | them.
        
         | jdeibele wrote:
         | Thank you for saying something about this. I make up answers to
         | "security" questions like: first pet's name? Favorite teacher?
         | and so on but that means that I have to record what the answer
         | is.
         | 
         | I've been doing that in the notes section for LastPass. I think
         | that I'm going to have to move to doing it in the Notes app
         | since that works on all my Apple devices. And it looks like I
         | can lock one Note without having to lock all of them.
        
           | woojoo666 wrote:
           | Last I checked, notes are included in the export. This post
           | is about attachments
        
             | Chad_King wrote:
        
           | mdaniel wrote:
           | In case you haven't already seen it, 1P has effectively a
           | "click button, get fake security question answers" and I love
           | it: https://support.1password.com/generate-security-
           | questions/
           | 
           | They use the "battery horse stable" scheme so you don't have
           | to read crazy ascii over the phone to customer support
        
             | no-reply wrote:
             | That is nice. I have ascii 24-48 characters with mixed
             | special characters. A garbled mess to read aloud.
        
             | BrandoElFollito wrote:
             | Bitwarden has the same. I just generated wobble-swaddling-
             | reflex-repost
        
       | jeroenhd wrote:
       | Looking at the export code:
       | https://github.com/bitwarden/clients/blob/da5e4a57d026e0d093...
       | 
       | The entire export process seems to be client side. Altering the
       | export to include files should be feasible though the Bitwarden
       | devs might choose not to merge your code because allowing users
       | to access all of those Azure buckets all at once must come at a
       | significant cost.
       | 
       | My workaround for this is to stuff SSH keys and the like in
       | secret fields rather than attachments. This doesn't work for
       | larger files, but it works well enough for my use cases so far.
        
       | jmull wrote:
       | ... is there some better way to back up your bitwarden data than
       | export?
       | 
       | Because if not, then I don't understand this. If you can't back
       | up attachments, they can't be used for anything important. If
       | they can't be used for anything important, then what are they
       | for?
       | 
       | It would be better to not have attachments at all than not let
       | people back them up.
        
       | foobiekr wrote:
       | This is sadly common. 1Password does not either.
        
         | selykg wrote:
         | Sort of a vendor lock in type deal.
        
         | jwong_ wrote:
         | Main thing keeping me off switching to something else.
         | 
         | 1Password's extensions getting worse with every update gets me
         | closer each day though.
        
           | mdaniel wrote:
           | The irony is that if they'd just open source them, it's not
           | like that's where their real intellectual property lies and
           | they may get a lot more help -- or at the bare minimum _I_
           | can see what the extension is screwing up in _my_ case and
           | fix it while they  "damn get around to it"
           | 
           | I'm waiting for someone to point out that BW's extensions are
           | open source and are still a dumpster fire, but for me the
           | difference is that BW started as a dumpster fire, so I don't
           | feel compelled to bring their extension up to sane operating
           | levels, whereas 1P's are _mostly_ right, and just need a
           | tune-up here and there
        
         | mdaniel wrote:
         | Incorrect, I just tested it:                   $ unzip -l
         | 1PasswordExport-ILESALYKVFDNJH3K24FEO3QRHM-20220611-100457.1pux
         | ...            1952  01-01-1980 00:00
         | files/dbp6d2jjtfbwbp5tnqx6vw5jaa__developerID_installer.pem
        
       | kosolam wrote:
       | Please stop rationalizing this. It's an awful bug in design.
       | Bitwarden company should give their immediate response. This is
       | completely devastating for my trust in this software and company.
        
         | kosolam wrote:
         | I am a paying customer, but a refund in this specific case is
         | like spitting on a dead body. The fact that they designed it
         | like that and never warned the users is treacherous. To all BW
         | employees that keep rationalizing this and downvoting my
         | comment: it's all funny and stuff until there is a great
         | damage. And then the shit hits the fan..
        
         | throw10920 wrote:
         | Rationalizing and discussion are more appropriate for HN than
         | an emotionally-manipulative comment like this one.
        
         | julianlam wrote:
         | > This is completely devastating for my trust in this software
         | and company.
         | 
         | Okay, I guess you should ask for a refund, then.
         | 
         | Yes, that's a snarky response, but in all seriousness, the BW
         | team is good at refunding, so if you're unsatisfied, ask for a
         | refund and move on.
        
         | onetom wrote:
         | Except a bug is an unintentional problem with something, which
         | exists. The backup feature not saving attachments is a missing
         | feature. You need to write more code to support it, NOT simply
         | modify existing code, which was already meant to provide this
         | feature, but because of some mistakes it doesn't.
        
         | 0des wrote:
         | > Bitwarden company should give their immediate response.
         | 
         | Why do people do this? The hands touch the hips, the call for a
         | rage mob is made because the internet must have justice, and
         | the kangaroo court begins.
         | 
         | Just use something else if it bothers you.
        
       | tluyben2 wrote:
       | I have been bitten by this. It is quite weird imho.
        
       | jiveturkey wrote:
       | I don't think 1password does either? Anyone know for sure? I
       | think they give you a separate attachments folder, but any item
       | loses its association to any attachment.
        
         | mdaniel wrote:
         | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31706068
        
           | jiveturkey wrote:
           | thanks. does the json for the pw item itself, reference the
           | attachment?
        
             | mdaniel wrote:
             | They generally do a good job of documenting their file
             | formats, and 1pux is no exception:
             | https://support.1password.com/1pux-format/#files-folder
             | 
             | I was able to use their opvault specification as a clean-
             | room implementation of a reader, so I can also attest that
             | their docs are accurate, too
        
       | Youden wrote:
       | It's been raised but doesn't appear to be a large enough issue to
       | be put on the roadmap: https://community.bitwarden.com/t/allow-
       | attachments-to-be-ex...
       | 
       | The project is open-source, maybe send them a pull request?
        
         | that_guy_iain wrote:
         | > The project is open-source, maybe send them a pull request?
         | 
         | Just because a project is open-source doesn't mean they'll
         | accept a pull request with your feature request in it.
        
           | matheusmoreira wrote:
           | Indeed. Few things are worse than spending time and effort
           | figuring out a complex repository, making and testing changes
           | to the code and sending in a patch only to get _ignored_.
        
             | grepfru_it wrote:
             | Good to see open source hasn't changed in 20 years. This
             | has been my biggest gripe. You have an idea, you present
             | real world use cases, you submit a patch.. Only to have
             | your idea ridiculed or ignored as you point out. THEN, a
             | few weeks/months/years later, your same patch is accepted
             | by someone else with a twitter blue checkmark to rave
             | reviews.
        
         | hotpotamus wrote:
         | I like Bitwarden and open source, but attachments are a paid
         | feature for them, so you'd be essentially working to add value
         | to their paid features for free. That feels unfair to me.
        
           | Aeolun wrote:
           | I think you'd be working to add quality to _your_ backups for
           | free. Sure, they'd also give it to other customers, but what
           | matters is that you have it (and henceforth do not have to
           | maintain your own fork).
        
             | hotpotamus wrote:
             | That's a more generous way of looking at it and certainly a
             | fair point.
        
               | revendell_elf wrote:
        
             | SahAssar wrote:
             | I think the point is more that you'd be giving away work
             | for free that is only usable by people paying someone other
             | than you.
        
           | _flux wrote:
           | Well the clients are still quite nice and you can use them
           | with VaultWarden for free and get attachments.
        
         | Vladimof wrote:
         | I never switched to Bitwarden because I don't like how it was
         | designed but this is clearly a huge bug even though I probably
         | wouldn't use the feature to attach files.
        
           | waplot wrote:
           | >because I don't like how it was designed
           | 
           | can you elaborate?
        
             | Vladimof wrote:
             | I already have a file server that is synced between my
             | devices so for me KeepassXC works better (i.e.: I don't
             | need to setup another server just for my password
             | manager)...
        
       | AnonHP wrote:
       | Bitwarden pivoted to serving enterprise needs (like SSO,
       | collaboration) a few years ago and hasn't given much attention to
       | improving the basic product itself (there still aren't additional
       | types, like licenses, WiFi passwords, etc.). You can file this as
       | an issue and wait.
        
         | capableweb wrote:
         | Just like every other product initially launched for consumers,
         | eventually pivoting to enterprises and forgetting about the
         | little guy.
         | 
         | Seems it's impossible for people to run companies for the
         | average consumer. Are their cash-flow really so bad they can't
         | help themselves going into the enterprise market or is there
         | something else going on?
        
           | sokoloff wrote:
           | Enterprises are vastly more willing to pay to have their
           | problems solved than consumers. (I say this as I see the
           | difference in behavior in my own two personas.)
           | 
           | Enterprises don't blink at paying $50K/yr for something to
           | improve security and save staff thousands of hours of time.
           | Consumers are used to things being (or appearing to be) free.
           | On a per-user basis, I'd expect consumers to ask more
           | questions of support, while paying much less.
        
           | richardw wrote:
           | Without meaning to disparage the OP, enterprises don't put
           | you on HN when their feature isn't supported. They pay enough
           | to focus the mind on important features.
           | 
           | Enterprises are an 80/20 play. Keep your top clients happy
           | and you'll be fine. The first time you get a large order you
           | realise that's where your focus should be.
        
         | waplot wrote:
         | bitwarden allows you to add custom fields and secure notes for
         | anything that falls outside the usual email/password data.
        
         | laurent123456 wrote:
         | I'm wondering why their enterprise clients are ok with this
         | though. I would have thought they'd get more pressure from them
         | since most businesses would not want to lose all their
         | attachments if there's a problem.
        
           | johnchristopher wrote:
           | Or maybe businesses forbid attachments in the first place or
           | maybe they haven't realized and are okay with what being now
           | locked in the service.
           | 
           | Isn't the bitwarden client opensource enough or the
           | implementation free that someone could come in and modify the
           | export functionality or add the functionality to the API ?
        
             | fomine3 wrote:
             | Probably enterprises don't want export feature by user.
        
               | rsstack wrote:
               | Organization export is separate from the user export and
               | it's only available to administrators.
               | 
               | I just checked - it's using the same code and is missing
               | attachments too.
        
           | dspillett wrote:
           | Perhaps attachments isn't an enterprise priority over things
           | like SSO support and other features that have seen changes
           | and additions?
        
             | rsstack wrote:
             | I only noticed attachments exist after this post. They are
             | pretty hidden away and there are other ways to store SSH
             | keys that do get included in the export.
        
           | phpisthebest wrote:
           | As an Enterprise Client, I did not even know there was
           | attachments, and i dont know what I would use attachments
           | for...
        
             | mdaniel wrote:
             | Splunk licenses (and likely a ton of other enterprise-y
             | software) are actual files, so when we renew our license,
             | it goes into 1P as an attachment on our Splunk item
             | 
             | I recognize that's not what _you_ would use attachments
             | for, but I 'm offering that there are enterprises that get
             | benefit from attachments, not just individual users
        
               | phpisthebest wrote:
               | We have Software Asset management tools that manage those
               | assests, This also tracks renewal dates, and various
               | other aspects of Software management that makes password
               | managers not a good fit.
               | 
               | Our password manager is just a password manager, I
               | suspect many other organizations are the same.
        
       | chipsa wrote:
       | Better solution that b64 the files is just make a zip file from
       | the attachments with them in folders by the name of the entry.
       | That said, I don't use the attachments feature (If I need to
       | securely store files, I store them elsewhere).
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | sigio wrote:
       | I use bitwarden/vaultwarden (self hosted), and didn't even know
       | there was an attachment option, so haven't used it upto now. I
       | did use notes (for storing stuff like ssh/gpg keys), and can
       | confirm that these are exported correctly. Attachments are also
       | not exported in vaultwarden as far as I can see.
       | 
       | I'll just stick to stuffing files in notes for now, as I had been
       | doing.
        
         | mdaniel wrote:
         | > Attachments are also not exported in vaultwarden as far as I
         | can see.
         | 
         | Understandable, since sibling comments are saying export
         | happens on the client side, and Vaultwarden is merely a server-
         | side replacement
         | 
         | Although also relevant is the sibling observation that if
         | you're already running Vaultwarden isn't "backup" less "export
         | from some faceless corporation" and more "take a backup of the
         | vaultwanden database"?
        
           | ravi-delia wrote:
           | In all fairness I think you can run Bitwarden self hosted
           | too, so it would also just be a database backup
        
       | moughxyz wrote:
       | File backups need to be done in real time, otherwise backing up
       | gigabytes of data on demand would be infeasible.
       | 
       | We recently released this feature for Standard Notes[0]. Files
       | you upload to your account from any device are automatically
       | encrypted and backed up to a local folder on your computer.
       | 
       | Granting companies full custody of your files today feels
       | reckless; local backups are a must. And better it be encrypted.
       | 
       | [0]: https://standardnotes.com
        
       | thiagocmoraes wrote:
       | I just found out this now and I'm upset. I've been a paying user
       | for a long time and won't use attachments anymore. Might as well
       | consider migrating to a different password manager to migrate my
       | attachments. Thanks for letting me know.
        
       | jka wrote:
       | Can you migrate storage of your SSH keys in Bitwarden to custom
       | fields[1]? Those should -- I think -- be exported with the
       | contents of the vault.
       | 
       | [1] - https://bitwarden.com/help/custom-fields/#custom-fields-
       | for-...
        
         | sigio wrote:
         | Custom fields, or notes, both are exported
        
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