Individual unlocking of secondary vaults gone in 1Password 6

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Comments

  • peskeguy
    peskeguy
    Community Member

    +1 for the return of this feature. I use it exactly as others have described, and feel very strongly that Multiple Vaults makes little sense if it is impossible to unlock them individually as desired. Remembering 2 passwords is not a burden. I've downgraded to 1Password 5 until fixed.

  • thurminator
    thurminator
    Community Member

    +1 for restoring this functionality if possible. I think others have already provided enough examples of why it can be important for individual users, so I hope it can return at some point. Kinda disappointed to have to downgrade as I had enjoyed some of the new 1Password 6 features. :(

  • Thanks for the feedback @peskeguy and @thurminator.

    Rick

  • schnaarius
    schnaarius
    Community Member

    @SecondMile summed it up the best so far! I've held my boss back from updating after I saw this feature was missing in 6...

    I think the feedback has been great from AgileBits and am looking forward to see what develops!

  • Nauktis
    Nauktis
    Community Member

    I'll add my feedback to this discussion.

    I don't understand why vaults need to be so complicated.
    Why do we need the notion of "master vault", "secondary vault", "shared vault", etc.
    This makes it very confusing and when it comes to security, confusion is really a bad thing.
    Now I understood a bit better how it works by reading this post but the fact that I could unlock all my vaults with one master password was extremely confusing to me.

    In my opinion, there should just be one type a vault. Each vault has a master password (an encryption key), THERE SHOULD NOT BE any link or hierarchy between vaults. This makes there management a pain (illustrated enough in this topic) for the user, for the devs as well apparently ... and it gives a very strange feeling of security as we do not know or understand what is happening behind the seen.

    I'm an IT engineer and I read the page (https://support.1password.com/secure-by-design/) which gives a bit of explanation but there is no documentation about the way vaults are implemented.

  • dszp
    dszp
    Community Member

    @nauktis While for some use cases your view is accurate, for other people the opposite is true. There was just a question someone asked @1Password on Twitter today wondering why/when the Windows version (which works now as you wish Mac did) would work like the Mac version and make things much more convenient. Frankly I'm fine with flexibility but having to remember (and type) one password to access multiple vaults is something I'm looking forward to on Windows as well.

    The Mac version (and iOS) stores the encrypted key to your secondary vaults inside your primary vault. Assuming your password is adequate to protect the information in your primary vault, it should equally protect access to any secondary vaults. Of course, if you goal is to unlock some and not others, that's the use case being discussed in this thread, but I don't think one way is clearly right for everyone (as the various viewpoints indicate).

    It sounds like enough people relied on the old method (which is kind of halfway between both, where secondary vaults could be unlocked separately but the primary always unlocked all secondaries) that AgileBits is considering how to both spend the time and implement this again in a more secure (as in, harder to make programming mistakes, not cryptographically) manner in the future (though nothing's been promised). I doubt they will entirely go towards the Windows version with each vault being entirely separate--that's more than one password to remember (against the name!) and the demand is there to move Windows away from that structure as well. But maybe their new implementation, when it exists, will allow that flexibility as an easy addition for those who want it. Obviously they're also trying to fit this all in with the development focused heavily on 1Password for Teams as well, which I'm guessing will delay things while they focus on that for a little while.

  • AGAlumB
    AGAlumB
    1Password Alumni

    I'll add my feedback to this discussion.

    @Nauktis: Thank you! :chuffed:

    I don't understand why vaults need to be so complicated.
    Why do we need the notion of "master vault", "secondary vault", "shared vault", etc.
    This makes it very confusing and when it comes to security, confusion is really a bad thing.
    Now I understood a bit better how it works by reading this post but the fact that I could unlock all my vaults with one master password was extremely confusing to me.

    Honestly, the setup is only as complicated as you need it to be. For example, many folks only have a single vault, and that's as simple as it gets. But for those of us who need or want to compartmentalize things or organize them in a certain way, multiple vaults are useful. But keep in mind that they're an option, not a requirement.

    In my opinion, there should just be one type a vault. Each vault has a master password (an encryption key), THERE SHOULD NOT BE any link or hierarchy between vaults. This makes there management a pain (illustrated enough in this topic) for the user, for the devs as well apparently ... and it gives a very strange feeling of security as we do not know or understand what is happening behind the seen.

    I think many people agree with you. But unfortunately(?), as dszp mentions, many also disagree. We get a lot of requests from 1Password for Windows users who want vaults to work there as they do in 1Password for Mac. And of course the converse is true too. It's difficult to please everyone, but we'll keep exploring ways to improve it.

    I'm an IT engineer and I read the page (https://support.1password.com/secure-by-design/) which gives a bit of explanation but there is no documentation about the way vaults are implemented.

    I'd like to hear a bit more about what information you're looking for. It may be that we could improve our documentation (if none already exists) in this area. And if you have specific questions you're looking for answers to, please ask them, as it may be a good starting point! :)

    It sounds like enough people relied on the old method (which is kind of halfway between both, where secondary vaults could be unlocked separately but the primary always unlocked all secondaries) that AgileBits is considering how to both spend the time and implement this again in a more secure (as in, harder to make programming mistakes, not cryptographically) manner in the future (though nothing's been promised).

    @dszp: Frankly, I'm not thrilled by the fact that we're talking about about three different paradigms here, especially since there doesn't seem to be any consensus on which is best overall. We need to do better. I only wish we knew what the answer was, but I'm sure it will come in time. :blush:

  • seehadley
    seehadley
    Community Member
    edited January 2016

    Prior to the upgrade, 1Password let my wife access a few common logins with a password that was comfortable for her to remember and not as complicated as the one I had as master for the majority of our logins. Now, realistically, we are going to have to either write down a complicated password or make our master password easier to remember so that she can use it too.

    Like others in this thread, I find the benefit of having multiple vaults shareable within a family limited by the fact that we all need to use the same password. It sounds like 1Password for Teams may be a solution, but so far I'm not willing to pay a monthly fee for just me and my wife. I have loved using 1Password, but this change is disappointing.

  • Hi @seehadley,

    Thanks for the feedback. We have to think through both the technical and interface issues to make it better on both sides before we can consider bringing this feature back. It'll take us some time. It's certainly useful to know how people are using it.

    Cheers.

    Rick

  • tompave
    tompave
    Community Member

    @littlebobbytables RE this reply:
    Thank you for the feedback.
    1) I am not relying on iCloud sync, so that's not a problem. I have downgraded now, and I am happy to confirm that the AgileBits Store version has picked up the fact that I had already purchased 1Password from the Mac App Store. That was quite seamless. Also interesting that 1Password 5 from the AgileBits Store seems to use different directories to save its preferences than the ones used by the version from the Mac App Store. I had to reconfigure it, but I guess it's convenient to consider 5.* and 6.* as different apps, given the current situation.
    2) Yes, I noticed. I did something similar years ago (I've been using 1Password for ages), but it doesn't seem to be possible anymore.

  • maxvptrsn
    maxvptrsn
    Community Member

    Please add me to the list of people who want to be able to maintain multiple separate vaults that are unlocked independently. The main use case for me is sensitive information in one vault and less sensitive in another.

    An aside - when creating the vaults in version 6 you are required to create a password for the vault - this leads me to believe that the password for the vault would work as in version 5 but in reality it serves absolutely no purpose other than confusion, which led me to this thread.

  • Daniel Matos
    Daniel Matos
    Community Member

    Hello.
    I found this thread while looking for the correct way to have two "levels" of item security (frequent daily use vault + strong security vault)
    So far I am only using one vault for personal items (I share other vaults with my team) but I would like to improve my 1Password workflow and it seems that the recently-disabled feature would solve my issue.
    Please consider my interest in having this issue dealt with as soon as possible.

    Thank you

  • Mirek Petricek
    Mirek Petricek
    Community Member

    Please, bring it back! For me (and apparently for others) this was a very important feature. I see no reason for having multiple vaults if you can't unlock them separately. Had to go back to 5.x until this is fixed. Please always think twice before removing features in a shipped product.

  • AGAlumB
    AGAlumB
    1Password Alumni

    @tompave: Great! That's a good short-term solution, but be sure to send us a copy of your Mac App Store receipt at support+licenses@agilebits.com so we can get you an actual AgileBits Store license in case you need it in the future (for example, on a Mac where you haven't previously installed it fro the App Store). Cheers! :)

  • AGAlumB
    AGAlumB
    1Password Alumni

    Please add me to the list of people who want to be able to maintain multiple separate vaults that are unlocked independently. The main use case for me is sensitive information in one vault and less sensitive in another.

    @maxvptrsn: Absolutely! Thanks for the feedback.

    An aside - when creating the vaults in version 6 you are required to create a password for the vault - this leads me to believe that the password for the vault would work as in version 5 but in reality it serves absolutely no purpose other than confusion, which led me to this thread.

    Sorry for the confusion! For most people, the purpose of using a separate vault with a separate Master Password is to share it — either with another device, or another person entirely. After all, if you're the only one using the vault, you can't exactly keep the other vaults' passwords from yourself.

    That said, there's probably a better way of managing multiple vaults in general. I hope we'll be able to find a solution that pleases most people.

  • AGAlumB
    AGAlumB
    1Password Alumni
    edited January 2016

    I found this thread while looking for the correct way to have two "levels" of item security (frequent daily use vault + strong security vault)
    So far I am only using one vault for personal items (I share other vaults with my team) but I would like to improve my 1Password workflow and it seems that the recently-disabled feature would solve my issue.

    @Daniel Matos: Thanks! This is something we're evaluating. It would be really helpful to know more about what you're trying to accomplish. Since you know the Master Passwords for your secondary vaults (and therefore can't keep them secret from yourself), and any shared vaults can require their Master Passwords in order for someone else to access them, the fact that you don't have to enter each Master Password to unlock every time doesn't seem to impact that case — so there may be something else that comes into play in your situation. Let me know!

  • AGAlumB
    AGAlumB
    1Password Alumni

    Please, bring it back! For me (and apparently for others) this was a very important feature. I see no reason for having multiple vaults if you can't unlock them separately. Had to go back to 5.x until this is fixed. Please always think twice before removing features in a shipped product.

    @Mirek Petricek: We put a lot of thought (and work) into this, as Rick mentioned in some earlier posts:

    We removed this ability in 6.0 because we found some security issues related to it, and once we knew of them we couldn't let it be with a clear conscience. I quite liked that feature, and would love to see it come back (built differently), but that's going to take some time.
    I would love for you to take this opportunity to tell us how you used the feature so that we can keep that in mind if/when we rebuild it.

    Much like enabling Secure Input in 1Password's text fields, this is another change which is unpopular with some people, but is important to make sure that 1Password keeps your data secure as we all expect it to. We're not happy about making people unhappy, but it also isn't acceptable to us to allow risk — or re-enable it by simply reverting a change that was made for good reasons.

    As mentioned earlier, the only way we're going that route again is if we can do it securely, and that will require some strategy. The more detailed feedback we can get, the better we'll be able to hone in on the most common uses and come up with something better. We're not going to simply "make it work the way it used to" though.

  • udowski
    udowski
    Community Member

    I recently changed from version 5 to 6 and was quite astonished when I noticed that I cannot unlock multiple vaults separately any more. For me it is the same situation as described by seehadley yesterday.

  • jcscx
    jcscx
    Community Member

    +1, can't really add more than what has already been said.

  • battlesman
    battlesman
    Community Member

    My wife owns the master password (primary vault) on 1Password, whereas I do not. I only know the password for my secondary vault. Prior to upgrading to 1Password 6, I could select my (secondary) vault without having to type in the master password first. But since upgrading to v. 6, I have to type hers in to access my secondary vault.

    Is this an intentional change? I didn't adjust any settings, to my knowledge.

    How can I change it back to this?


    1Password Version: 6
    Extension Version: 4.5.2
    OS Version: 10.11.3
    Sync Type: Dropbox

  • Stephen_C
    Stephen_C
    Community Member

    @battlesman I have merged your new post into a very long existing thread about the same subject.

    Stephen

  • AGAlumB
    AGAlumB
    1Password Alumni

    Like others in this thread, I find the benefit of having multiple vaults shareable within a family limited by the fact that we all need to use the same password.

    @seehadley, @udowski: It sounds like you're all in a similar situation. Could you help us understand a bit better? In my experience, one benefit of sharing a vault means that it can be setup as a primary or secondary depending on each person's preference.

    We won't be rolling back this change; rather, it may be that we can offer functionality in the future that will help — but not at the expense of security. So any insight you can provide may help us come up with a solution that makes things better for you without making things worse overall.

  • AGAlumB
    AGAlumB
    1Password Alumni
    edited January 2016

    My wife owns the master password (primary vault) on 1Password, whereas I do not. I only know the password for my secondary vault.

    @battlesman: Can you explain what you mean by your wife 'owns the Master Password'? It sounds like it may make more sense to have your own vault setup as your primary, which would then be your own Master Password which is required to unlock — as you seem to expect. Does that make sense?

    Prior to upgrading to 1Password 6, I could select my (secondary) vault without having to type in the master password first. But since upgrading to v. 6, I have to type hers in to access my secondary vault.
    Is this an intentional change? I didn't adjust any settings, to my knowledge.
    How can I change it back to this?

    Sorry for the confusion! This is a change that was made a few weeks ago with 1Password 6 which addresses some other limitations of previous versions.

  • bdesham
    bdesham
    Community Member

    Add me to the list of people who are disappointed by this change.

    Here’s my use case: I use 1Password on my work computer. I have a personal vault and a work vault. It’s very important that my boss have access to my work vault in case I am “hit by a bus”, as the saying goes. Under 1Password 5 I could give my boss my work-vault password and he would be able to log in to just that vault. Now there’s no way for me to grant him access to my work passwords without also giving him access to all of my personal stuff! There’s no way for me to continue to use 1Password without either neglecting my professional obligations or else giving my employer all of my most sensitive personal information.

    It seems that this behavior isn’t for everyone, but I would love it if my personal and work vaults could be completely separated: each has its own password and can only be unlocked by typing its password. I think it would be a mistake to lean on the “one password” branding so heavily that you push away the users who really do need to use multiple passwords for the multiple facets of their lives.

  • tadiba
    tadiba
    Community Member

    I have a separate vault that an employee uses with less sensitive passwords in it. Now that this feature is disabled, I do not know how to let her access what she needs without my presence! This is terrible.

  • Mirek Petricek
    Mirek Petricek
    Community Member
    edited January 2016

    @brenty: Can you explain what you mean by your wife 'owns the Master Password'? It sounds like it may make more sense to have your own vault setup as your primary, which would then be your own Master Password which is required to unlock — as you seem to expect. Does that make sense?

    I don't think one needs a lot of imagination to figure out what is wrong with your suggestion. Obviously, when I set separate passwords to keychains and keep things separate it's done for a purpose. It doesn't really matter which keychain is the master - what we want is to be able to use them separately. Unlike phones, Macs are often shared devices in a family. Or event at workplace. It is very common that browser sessions are shared. Or I keep my private stuff separate from work-related vault (so that I can give emergency access to my colleagues when I am on vacation), etc.

    I see what Rick was saying. However, if there were some "theoretical" and unexploited security issues in the way how you internally handled application state, perhaps a better solution would be to fix the problem rather than kill a popular feature. I only want to believe that the rework on this won't get deprioritised in order to give us more reasons to sign up for 1password for teams subscriptions...

  • tompave
    tompave
    Community Member

    I only want to believe that the rework won't get deprioritised in order to give us more reasons to sign for 1password for teams subscriptions...

    I don't think that I would consider 1Password for teams at the moment. Non after seeing how this issue is being handled: "we won't try to reintroduce it, but we might add something similar".

  • tompave
    tompave
    Community Member
    edited January 2016

    Dear staff, it appears that my latest message has been removed. May I ask why?

    EDIT: and now it reappeared. I guess it was a caching issue.

  • jhhartley
    jhhartley
    Community Member

    +1 from me as well. My "master" vault is my own, and I have a secondary vault that is only for work. Unless doing personal business online at work, I much prefer to just limit myself to my work vault. For one thing, my master password is quite long and easy to mis-type, intentionally, but my work vault password is shorter. Still secure, but shorter.

This discussion has been closed.