Bitwarden Authenticator is a standalone app that is available for everyone, even non-Bitwarden customers.
In its current release, Bitwarden Authenticator generates time-based one-time passwords (TOTP) for users who want to add an extra layer of 2FA security to their logins.
There is a comprehensive roadmap planned with additional functionality.
Available for iOS and Android
You’re right, it does. This is a head-scratcher.
I guess they already had the TOTP code written, so creating a standalone app was trivial, but what’s the point?
Security-wise it’s not a good idea to keep passwords and 2FA codes in the same client as it then becomes a single point of failure. A standalone authenticator app resolves that as long as it’s not unlocked with the same master password. A standalone app also opens a venue for non-BW customers to get on their platform.
It’s not a good idea to keep both on the same device, but i wouldn’t use it at all if it was a struggle
Would it count if the application is the same but all the TOTP is handled by a different database with a different passphrase?
Depends on how they got broken
TOTP in the Bitwarden Vault is a paid feature. The standalone app is free, and doesn’t even require a Bitwarden account.
This allows free tier users a way to use TOTP without upgrading, and without needing to trust Google Authenticator or something else.
TOTP code is like 5 lines. The hardest part is writing the seed to disk.
thd totp in the default application is paid and that isn’t
Because you can enable totp on your Bitwarden account and it would be dumb to store the password and totp for your biwarden vault in your vault?
Also it can act as a stepping stone for non Bitwarden customers, before getting their own vault.