Please make an account system that would be a replacement for the Brave Sync Chain system to back all of your data up to your account automatically and access it from there instead of it being stored on your devices to view it in case something happens to your devices and you can’t access your data from them. It would be a very useful feature and there would be less hassle and peace of mind knowing that my data is safely stored in Brave’s servers and easily accessible.
Firefox has this feature, so if it’s essential to you then you could switch to that. If you want it implemented in Brave it would be a good idea to open an issue with the Chromium project, which is an upstream project from Brave.
@Mythical5th this particular request wouldn’t be an upstream one. They are just asking for an account based sync, such as with a username and password. This exists on other Chromium based browsers but is one that Brave has deviated from.
In having account based sync, it’s easier for people to hack into. It also tends to give an easier access for companies to be able to see your data. Brave has decided to go with a privacy centered approach using a cryptographic key that they have no access to. All data remains encrypted only in the hands of the user.
@fBmsbWNr38q4Hs the above part as an explanation, Brave has essentially said they don’t want to use a permanent account based setup. Sync is not intended as a backup though it can be used as one if you have multiple devices.
In terms of things happening to devices, you’d be good to try to get yourself to do backups every once in a while. Or if you just absolutely want something account based, there are plenty of password managers you can use, such as Bitwarden or 1Password.
@Saoiray I was responding to an earlier edit that asked for something “that would replace the Brave Sync Chain system” and didn’t mention having data stored on Brave’s servers. This would require a separate program for users to install as a server, and a UI in the browser where we could specify the server address and credentials.
As for Brave not having account-based sync, that may be partially incorrect. If you open Dev Tools (Ctrl+Shift+J) and then open the settings, at the bottom of the Preferences section it shows an email address which you are “Signed into Chrome as”. I don’t know what it is, but it does suggest something about how sync works behind the scenes.
You’re right, if technical. If you go to brave://sync-internals you’ll see a Username, which is the same info as you can see in the part you’re speaking about. As for it saying Chrome on the Dev Tools section, just seems they forgot to switch up the name. When they strip things and add in their own, they usually change out all mentions of Chrome or Chromium and replace with Brave, but not happening there.
But yes, we have “accounts” but it’s the long string of numbers and it’s not something we put in anywhere. So not like anyone can rip it and then try to login to our account.
Or you could make it so that the Brave Sync Chain code never expires and instead of syncing data between devices, it backs up all of your data automatically to Brave servers and you can access your data from there.
@fBmsbWNr38q4Hs honestly, we kind of have that now. I kind of touch on that at Daily Expiring Sync Codes: Not Meant for Backup.
We still can get the final word that changes daily, which kind of makes it simple as long as we keep the rest of the code. It’s just that they have claimed that will eventually change.
It used to remain the same at all times, but too many people were stupid about things. They scanned the code provided in help articles which shared passwords with other people doing the same, posted screenshots of their codes on forums and social media when asking for help, etc. Brave responded to the idiocrasy by making codes expire. But then tons of people complained because they couldn’t recover data, so they ended up with the situation we’re at now…codes expire but we have a means to still use them.
It is an over-engineered mess. I get what they want to accomplish, but there are more user-friendly ways to accomplish it. Adding a few options into how you would like to handle the sync chain. Even then, it just isn’t a trust-worthy system