I suddenly lost a huge amount of my passwords. I tried the suggested fixes from last year, but I can’t even see the Admin Console option anywhere in the password manager web page. Not in the settings and not in the square icon in the top right corner.
Furthermore, there’s no ‘unassigned’ folder. Only a ‘items with no folder’ which also doesn’t contain the missing passwords.
Hi @Ash_F can you share more about your setup? Are you a family or business admin, or part of an organization? You can always contact official support using the form here: Help Center | Bitwarden
@Ash_F Welcome to the forum!
In addition to providing more information about your setup, could you please verify that what you are observing is reproducible (e.g., by logging in from different browsers and different devices)? Occasionally, there are login glitches that cause the vault data not to be decrypted, which can result in the app showing an empty vault; however, such glitches are generally rare and intermittent, so even logging in and logging out again should fix it (or if your local browser is stuck in some strange state, logging in from elsewhere should fix the issue).
Also, I have changed the topic app: tag from app:browser to app:web-vault, since you seem to be describing the Web Vault app. If you are also having problems with the browser extensions or other apps, please advice.
You might try using a different browser, using incognito mode or clearing your browser history (chrome link) to see if a cached something is messing you up.
Also, check your other devices (after putting them in to airplane mode) to see if any of them are logged in and if so, create a backup so that you don’t risk things getting worse.
The Admin Console should be here in the web vault (but also in the top right corner…):
Apart from glitches etc. – are you sure you are trying to login with the admin account? Only the admin or “owner” account has access to the Admin Console.
Thank you for your suggestions. Here’s what I’ve tried so far:
for accessing the admin console, I think I’m unable to see it because I’m not using a family or business account? It’s just a regular user.
Does this mean that the disappeared passwords are lost forever?
@Ash_F Do you have a recent vault backup? If so you should be able to restore that. However, don’t do that just yet. It may not be that the items aren’t in your vault any longer, that’s why more info is needed.
Is there any device where you do see the password items? Browser extension? Phone?
Also when you say password items are missing, please clarify, the entire entry is gone or just the password field is blank? I assume the former but just want to be sure we are understanding exactly what you are seeing (and not seeing).
Also, please clarify if you meant by that either that you did use these fixes last year “successfully” (= last year, the Admin Console was there for you) or if you just read about that “suggested fixes from last year” (= and you don’t know, if the Admin Console was ever there for you or not)?
So, you were always a “regular user” (= free or premium account)? - Did you ever or do you still share passwords with another person or persons (= was your BW account part of an “organization” and you also had access to one or more “collections”)?
Please try to answer all questions (also those from all the other posts!), as at the moment, I think no one of us can say with certainty what may have happened (based on the given information).
In addition to the questions asked by myself and others earlier in this thread, could you please respond to the following?
In the statement quoted above, are you saying that some passwords appear to be missing, but that other passwords remain visible in your vault?
If there are still some passwords present in your vault, were any of them created or modified recently (before the “missing” password problem started, but within the past year), or do they all seem to be passwords that have existed for a long time?
What operating system and browser are you using?
Have you ever used any Bitwarden client apps (e.g., desktop app, mobile app) or browser extensions, besides the Web Vault app?
Other than the missing passwords, do you experience any unusual behavior (error messages, slow load times, etc.) when logging in to the Web Vault?
Think very carefully about the past, and answer the following to the best of your recollection: Have you ever in the past registered (even temporarily) for a Bitwarden account using a different email address from the one that you are now using, or registered for a Bitwarden account hosted on a different server from the one you are now using (i.e., bitwarden.com vs. bitwarden.eu, or even a self-hosted server) — whether intentionally, or by mistake?
Have you ever in the past created a “free organization” attached to your account?
Has your account ever in the past had access to any passwords (or other vault items) that were shared with any other Bitwarden account?
The more information that you provide, the more likely it is that we will be able to figure out whether your missing passwords are recoverable or not.
When I started facing the issue a couple of days ago, I went and looked for a solution, the latest solutions were from last year. I tried applying them and they did not work.
I thought the Admin Console was available for all users. When I couldn’t find it, I realised that it’s not available for free normal users.
I tried to attach the screen cap of the side menu which also doesn’t show any Admin Console, but I’m limited to just 1 per post.
I’ve always been a normal, free user. My vault is mine only and I haven’t shared anything from it with anyone. Only used browser extensions and never downloaded an app on any device nor hosted locally.
yes. Not all passwords are missing.
There are passwords that were created as recent as last week. I can’t find any of those. And some of the remaining passwords are outdated (can’t tell for sure how long were they last updated, but definitely a few months ago).
I have two machines, 1 is a Win 10 and the other is Win 11. I use Firefox on both which is synced between the two devices. I tried to install the Edge extension on my Win 11 and login today, but the vault’s content are still the same as the one on Firefox.
I think I only ever opened the Web Vault twice, including yesterday when I was trying to find a syncing issue and the Admin Console.
I’ve only been using the browser extension. I used to use Opera GX as my main browser but I ditched it last year for Firefox. Never experienced any problems with my vault on Firefox until a couple of days ago.
Nothing that I could notice. No error messages, no slow load times. I also checked the sync time immediately just to eliminate the syncing possibility. I keep checking the syncing time and it’s been in sync each time so far.
I’m positive that I’ve been using the same account ever since I signed up and it’s been in bitwarden.com. Never self-hosted.
but can I login to another server to confirm?
I’ve never explored the free organization option before. ever
I’ve always had only 1 account which I’m currently facing this issue with.
Thank you.
Yes, please go to https://vault.bitwarden.eu/#/login, and enter your Bitwarden username/master password there.
Yes, but has any other Bitwarden user ever shared passwords with you, or have you ever shared passwords with any other Bitwarden user?
If your problem started April 8 or later, then I would suggest that you contact Bitwarden Support a.s.a.p., describe your issue (including a link to this Community Forum thread), and request that they restore your account data from a backup. They may be willing to do so if the issue was due to a server-side problem (but the backup data is only retained for 7 days, so you must act quickly).
If you chose to follow @grb’s advise, which I do recommend, first create an export of your vault in unencrypted JSON format and place it on a flash drive that is normally offline.
When they restore a 7 day old backup, you will lose anything created or updated in the past 6 days. JSON backups are as complete as you can get, and the unencrypted format is somewhat human readable. It may serve as a handy reference for bringing the restored vault back up to current.
Other than this one “special” situation, it is better to use password protected JSON export. Here is a good reference for creating reliable backups.
It should be. Free accounts are permitted to create one organization. Organizations are the raison d’etre for the amin console. That said, the lack of an admin console is not important right now. Recovering the missing data is much more time-sensitive. After that, get everything into a current backup.
Eventually restoring the admin console might require creating a new vault and importing the backup into it. Not difficult, but also would significantly complicate recovering the missing data in the old/current vault.
I contacted support about this. They said that they don’t offer individual recoveries but instead I can import my own backup using the methods here Import Data to your Vault | Bitwarden . So I guess that’s no longer an option.
@Ash_F I would get yourself into the habit of making encrypted JSON backups every time you make a vault data change that you consider significant. For example: if I add a financial account, I right away make a backup and save it multiple places (encrypted hard drive, encrypted cloud storage, etc.) If I add something insignificant I may wait until I either have a new signficant change, or several insignificant ones, before making vault backups.
@Ash_F Somewhat trivial, but as it was not mentioned before, I would like to “throw it in” at least: in case the items got accidentally deleted - did you already look in the trash / bin for your items?
Yes, recovery from Bitwarden’s side is only possible if they can be convinced that the problem was caused on their end. I had hoped that there would be sufficient evidence in this forum thread to raise that as a possibility (e.g., the fact that you’ve only used the web Vault twice, but it is impossible to accidentally bulk delete a large number of passwords unless one uses the Web Vault).
Did you ever try to log in to the bitwarden.eu server?
I did check the bin actually but it was empty. Not sure if the reason for this problem was the latest FF update. I reckon that probably is not possible. But the issue happened when I immediately logged back in to the vault after FF restarted.
I only ever thought about logging in to the Web Vault after the logins went missing, hoping that they accidentally went to the bin or if I could find the Admin Console. So I’m pretty sure logging in to the Web Vault caused this issue.
I don’t think I ever logged in to bitwarden.eu, because every time I’m instantly forwarded to the .com server.
