Password Managers: KeePassXC VS Bitwarden

Tom here for more systems and happy New Year and I'm happy to say here in 2023 I think we're going to keep continuing the discussions around password management the recent LastPass breaches that happened towards the end or at least we found out about them towards the end of 2022 has it in the news and also in people's minds which I think is great I want people thinking more critically about security but that leads you to the next question of where should I store my passwords and bit Worden big fan of it been using it for years that's my preferred place to store it but keepass XC comes up a lot I want to do a dress X I think it's a good password manager so too long didn't watch yes go ahead and use it let's talk about what they have in common first both store passwords in a vault securely which is great they use strong cryptography and I said the date at the beginning not just because it's a happy new year and it's 2023 but as of right now as of the recording of this video I don't know of any flaws in either one of these in the encryption I used that would allow someone to get in next both have good browser Integrations with chrome or Firefox the browser integration I think is really important because you want to make sure the URL you're at matches before it fills in this is something people should always be suspicious of and where password managers can help with phishing links where you found a link someone sent you for some reason you decided to click it and it doesn't autofill that's odd wonder why it's not Auto filling oh the domain doesn't match because the domain typos and squatting it's one more extra layer of protection I think by having it integrate in the browser also convenient that when you're storing and typing passwords and creating new passwords for forms in the browser that you can save it right back into your password manager so as you create these unique passwords they get saved right in your smoothie without having to go back and forth and copy and Fades alt tab between a desktop app speaking of desktop apps both are cross-platform and have desktop apps now keepass XC is only really a desktop apples or it's Mac window or Linux and as I said offer the browse integration versus the way bitward works is going to be a server that it talks to whether you host that server yourself and I've done a video on self-host seeing bit Warden or you use bit words backhand which I think is perfectly secure because they have a zero knowledge back end so it's encrypted before it gets synced over to them either way you use it the synchronization is occurring and a desktop app is either local as in keepassex or talking back out there now in case you're ever wondering what bit Ward and what happens if the server can't be reached whether you self-host or use them it'll cache the last known copies of the password with keypass XC it has to have access to the database file that you create when you set up keypass XC so there's a little Nuance difference in there but as I said both have desktop apps now both can store totp alongside with your passwords which I don't think is a great idea um this is something maybe for a lab it's okay but once you get out in the real world there's a few exceptions I have a couple forums out of convenience of not wanting to put it on my phone yeah I probably saved a couple forums with totp in there so worst case if someone got my password manager someone breaches it well and they went to some of the forums that I go to they might have that ability to totp log in if they were to take it I don't know how you know good that is but I belong to so many forums having that many of them on my phone for storing it that would be a pain to you know manage all that so I'll let you guys roast me in the comments on my choices for that now this is where bit Warden goes a little about beyond what key pass XC does bit Warden free version offers synchronizing of your data with keepassexe you got to do that yourself they also use bit word and send and the free version lets you send text files only this is a really clever system I've done a video on it before that allows you to send someone a specialized link that you can control and maybe give them a password of you because you want to send a block of text in a secure way you can say view once or view many times or whatever the parameters are or let it expire based on different parameters you put in there so I think this is a really cool feature to share some piece of knowledge in a text format if you buy the paid subscription you can go ahead and send them files as well in a secure format and same rules apply now let's go a little further bitward and Enterprise which is a paid offering they offer full event log auditing SSO and API access now when it comes to the event auditing of the logs and the way I work with my staff being able to know who accessed what when and have an immutable log for that is really important for security when you're managing it for a business and a group of people like I do so this is one of the reasons we like the bit Warden with the bit Warden Enterprise and it's why keepass XT wouldn't be a fit within my company now keep ask XC can be easily synced as I mentioned you can use a file synchronization tool such as sync thing Dropbox or whatever you prefer now this is that split as I said if you're a home lab and you're just doing it yourself keep sxc is fine matter of fact synchronizing it with a couple computers because you really want to make sure you back up that file or synchronize it between the different systems you have I think it's a great choice and you're right if you said hey I use Heap sxc I don't see the purpose and a password bandage like bitward which is like a really common comment people replied to me on the bit Warden video on for individual users I don't see this as a problem for someone like myself running a business or if you just have a use case that requires you to create a shared collection between multiple people and be able to keep that up to date with shared passwords and shared credentials in there it weren't a better choice for that use case now if you're probably wondering why would sites need to share shouldn't everyone have their own individual users yes I wish that was the case I wish everything was you know simple like that unfortunately dealing with many of these sites that's just not how that works sites are always behind because someone may have already asked what about the new pass keys and some of the other features that we're seeing come out the industry's ability to create new standards versus the industry's ability to adopt new standards are always opposed to each other companies aren't quick to adopt and change the code on the back end that allows all these systems to integrate them smoothly now we could be talking in a future now that's not January 1st of 2023 where I'm completely wrong and all this is irrelevant and this video doesn't make any sense anymore because we've come up with this incredible new way of authentication and but you know we are in reality right now Cherry reverse of 2023 where we do need all these Integrations still and that's why I made this video so leave your thoughts down below about key pass XC or bit word and which one you like but I still think he has sexy if I was just an individual and didn't have to deal with a bunch of other people needing to share passwords or credentials information with them via a secure method like bitward I think it's a great tool to use let me know which one you use down in the comments below or what other thoughts you have on this topic or if there's some other topic you want me to cover or head over my forums for a more in-depth discussion thanks

Channel: Lawrence Systems

Views: 78,969

Keywords: LawrenceSystems, password managers, password manager, best password manager, best free password manager, keepass password manager, free password manager, password security, keepass review, open source, keepass tutorial, bitwarden review, bitwarden password manager, open source software, keepasxc, keepassxc, keepass vs bitwarden, keepassxc browser integration

Id: 46aiqnEHOVU

Length: 6min 58sec (418 seconds)

Published: Sun Jan 01 2023