LogMeIn acquires LastPass password manager
LastPass, the company behind the popular cloud-based password manager LastPass, just announced that it has been acquired by LogMeIn, a company known for products such as Hamachi, Cubby or its line of remote support applications.
According to the announcement, the LastPass team continues to work on its product including the free version which will remain available for the time being.
The company promises to introduce new features in coming months as it becomes part of the LogMeIn family of products.
We will continue to build and improve LastPass for our free, Premium, and Enterprise customers. Together with LogMeIn, we’ll be able to accomplish more, faster – providing an even better service to millions of people. As we become part of the LogMeIn family over the next several months, we’ll be releasing updates to LastPass, introducing new features, and continuing to grow the service as we work to bring LastPass to millions more who struggle with passwords.
Customer reactions are mostly negative right now based on LogMeIn's reputation of removing free account support from products in 2014 and starting to cross-sell products to increase revenue.
At least some users fear that LogMeIn could repeat this by ending support for the free version of LastPass.
LogMeIn's press releases offers additional information about the deal. It mentions a purchase price of $125 million US Dollars ($110 million in cash and $15 million if certain milestones are reached) and the closing of the deal in the coming weeks.
The company plans to integrate previous identity management investments like Meldium into LastPass, to support both product lines near-term and unify them under the LastPass service and brand in the future.
Following the close of the deal, LogMeIn plans to bring complementary capabilities of its early identity management investments, including those of Meldium, which it acquired in September 2014, into LastPass. In the near-term, both the Meldium and LastPass product lines will continue to be supported, with longer-term plans to center around a singular identity management offering based on the LastPass service and brand.
Existing LastPass users need to evaluate whether they are trusting LogMeIn as much as they have trusted LastPass with their data and the future of the password manager.
Existing users can export their database of passwords to import it in another password manager such as KeePass should they come to the conclusion that they don't trust LogMeIn to the same extent that they have trusted LastPass in the past.
This is definitely too technical for me, but maybe Martin could make a post out of it, or some readers may comment:
http://www.martinvigo.com/even-the-lastpass-will-be-stolen-deal-with-it/
You are posting comments too quickly. Slow down.????? twice -this is my only post
Marco you should have read their site
”How is Sticky Password reputation in terms of reputation, security, hackers attacks, and so on?”
Your master password is known only to you. No one else
We never save it on our servers or send it over the Internet. By default, we don’t even save it on your devices. It only exists in your head.
The hackers’ nightmare: AES‑256
The data encryption used in Sticky Password is based on the world’s leading encryption standard AES‑256 – the same data encryption used by military and government organizations.
It seems to me that most of the negative responses here have been fear that the free version of Lastpass will go away.
I understand that some people don’t like their “stuff” to be somewhere other than in their own possession. However, I’ve been using the pay version for a few years. I switched to Lastpass from Keepass specifically for the 2-factor authorization feature.
Once I read Steve Gibson’s take on LastPass (https://www.grc.com/sn/sn-256.htm), it was good enough for me.
Can someone tell me why they would change from Lastpass to something else because of LogMeIn’s purchase (other than having to pay for it)?
I dumped Last Pass and changed all of my passwords right after Last Pass was hacked the first time. I switched to KeePass Password Safe and have been happy with that as my go to password manager for years! KeePass is the ONLY way to go and I recommend it to everyone I know.
Another concern is that they might discontinue supporting the extension for the Linux distributions.
Hi there,
This news is not a great one.
I just tried to move to KeePass, the process to export all my LastPass passwords and import them in LastPass was very quick and smooth.
My question now is: is there a way to automated KeePass passwords, like I do in LastPass, so that whenever I visit a site which requires login, such login is completely automatic?
From what I could see, you need to open the KeePass database, locate the URL (in the Title field), push or select open URL etc. This very time-consuming.
Thanks,
Marco
Download the Keefox extension. It’s a Keepass plugin but it’s not perfect. There are still websites it doesn’t recognize and therefor a pain in the butt still.
Thank you robert. I’ll try the Keefox extension (I’m on Windows so the fact that the may discontinue supporting the Linux extension shouldn’t be an issue in my case.
My main concern though is that the Keefox extensions is by a third-party developer, Luckyrat, connected to http://keefox.org/.
So our passwords would go through yet another entity on top of KeePass, which might create security issues.
Not to mention that while LastPass supports all browser platforms, KeePass, at least with the Keefox extension, is limited to Firefox.
I’ve switched over the weekend to Sticky Password and it seems pretty ok. Like the WiFi sync.
How is Sticky Password reputation in terms of reputation, security, hackers attacks, and so on?
Also, some advanced features such as save to cloud and password syncrhonization come only with the paid version, not in the free version.
I don’t know, but they have never been hacked – or at least I haven’t found any info – they also have a strong security background – ex-AVG security experts – according to their website at least.
Well yes, if I give someone my passwords, I better pay them. Nothing comes free in this world and when it does, it sucks or has tons of ads.
tried a few yuuuk then found sticky password This looks very good
I’ve been trying to find the time to switch from LastPass to KeePass for weeks now. This just gave me the motivation to find that time sooner rather than later.
I switched a few months ago and i’m glad i did. i love keepass. the great thing is that you can import your info from lastpass into keepass.
morning – starting outlook – inbox mail – LastPass – LastPass Joins LogMeIn -oh shit, i used hamachi long long time ago but after they took it from 10 people/network appeared a 4 limit and later none or something like this. at start was 10 free and if 1 premium was there the limit was now 25/network
read their email thinking of another password manager, now looking in my RSS folders ( outlook :P) and found the article here, and i though i am the minority that is disappointed :(
@Mark – can you “scan” the web and make a small comparison between the existing options for password managers?
This is terrible news for Lastpass customers. I love Lastpass. I can’t stand Logmein after the way they treated the customers of their free product. Logmein will kill the free version of Lastpass. Sadly, I’m forced to make plans to quit Lastpass.
I don’t like Dashlane but that’s where I’ll be going if Lastpass free is removed.
Very sad about this news, I’m a long time Lastpass Premium user. I just turn off LP subscription automatic payment renewal. It’s time to move to KeePass + Dropbox.
Maybe it’s time for me to move to Dashlane
I guess it’s time to make the switch to Keepass2 for once and for all.
Anyone have any experience with KeepassX?
Yes, it worked fine. Though I believe at some point, it was only compatible with KeePass 1.x databases. That might not be true these days, but it’s worth double checking just to be sure.
Since my previous post on this page, I’ve already switched to Keepass +Keefox. It was a simple matter to export all my Lastpass info into a csv file, then import that into Keepass. I then added the highly regarded (and open-source) extension Keefox to Firefox and connected the extension to Keepass. Works like a charm.
You need to have Keepass start with windows, and always Close to Systray. It needs to be running for Keefox to maintain its connection.
I’m very happy with this solution and am now about to delete my Lastpass account, if possible. No way will I trust my info to Logmein. Good riddance. Btw, I looked on Lastpass’ blog post on this news, and the comment section below was running nearly 100% against.
Also make sure to change all your passwords (strong ones and all unique) .. because shit deleted from the internet is never really deleted
A very good point. For what it’s worth, Lastpass account deletion was very easy to do, and they claim the info is completely gone, but doesn’t hurt to change pw’s anyway to make sure.
I hope Xmarks remains free.
Excellent article, informative quotes, the first I read about this!
I cannot resist adding a personal opinion here. Obviously, using one central cloud-based passwords storage service is very convenient, and of course I know how all of them keep assuring us they do use safe encryption. But still this take-over illustrates just one of several reasons why I myself never succumbed to the temptation to use such a service.
In my view, the only truly secure passwords storage is a well-encrypted and well-hidden local one, managed by no one but the individual user.
Yeah, I agree. I can see why people would like and use LastPass, but personally I have never been comfortable with subscription software and as a result, after much deliberation, will always refuse to be tied to a subscription model.
Not only do you have to worry about companies being bought out by a less moral company, or companies just deciding to increase their prices on a whim, but I just don’t like the uncertainty of being locked into a subscription, where who knows what will happen in the future. And also who knows when you may find yourself suddenly unemployed, ill, in financial difficulty, etc. When you have physical software with licence key, you can always keep using that offline and without fear of a company locking you out if you fail to keep paying them.
I must say though, Lastpass were one of the better subscription services where you could pay up to ten years in advance and were reasonably priced, but all it takes is a takeover or bankruptcy and you still become unstuck.
This is disgusting news. I’m sick about this. I guess it’ll soon be time to switch to 1Password or another alternative. It’s a matter of time before logmein monetizes the hell out of LP and makes it a full pay service.
Also, for those who use Xmarks, that is a part of Lastpass, which I guess means Logmein owns that now too.
I use 1Password it’s nice on windows, mac, and ios but not happy with the android version. I’m a little surprised by this move I would of thought LastPass was doing well with their subscription model, although i’ve never and will never use it.
Hard as it may be to believe, a company doesn’t have to be treading water in order to go through a business deal like this.