Questioning Stability of Local-Only Mode?

[jojo]

What do you need help with?

I don’t remember seeing this prompt before, but it alerted me a little - apart from that fact that one accepts the management of their own data on their local device, and making sure they have their own backups, are there any other security or data loss risks with local only? This is the first time I saw local-only mode described as ‘experimental’ - are there any issues or aspects of local only that I should know about?

Image or Video

OS

N/A

Anytype Version

0.43.0

Network Mode

local only

Technical Information

N/A

[almost-sander-waffle]

The release notes for desktop 0.43 say:

@Geladariia

Warning switch to “Local Only” network: we’ve added a notification and additional confirmation before selection.

From the relevant code changes:

• The warning language and confirmation prompt at onboarding was added in anytype-ts#906 (reflected in v0.42.11-alpha onwards)
• The warning language (the text you see in the prompt buttons) was updated in anytype-ts#916

I of course can not speak for the Anytype team, but my interpretation is that the risk of data loss is higher for two reasons:

• the potential for bugs in the p2p sync functionality
• opting out of backup to the Anytype Network

If there are additional risks, they are not clear to me and some input from the Anytype team would be much appreciated.

[trymeout]

Does local only mode not encrypt any data in transit when syncing between devices? And will the security be enhanced in the future for Local only mode?

Local Only mode security? · anyproto · Discussion #321

[Filip]

@trymeout

Does local only mode not encrypt any data in transit when syncing between devices?

Syncing is always end-to-end encrypted.

@trymeout

And will the security be enhanced in the future for Local only mode?

Which aspect of security would you like enhanced?

[trymeout]

The message says you get no security benefits. What security benefits are these?

[lanesawyer]

It could potentially be better phrased as no additional security benefits. All the same secure features of Anytype work in local mode.

[anton]

Yep it’s correct. Much better phrasing.

[trymeout]

What additional security benefits does the anysync server provide over P2P syncing?

[krst]

it is another backup of your data. you are then more safe when it comes to data loss or corruption on your local devices. there is no additional security layer. perhaps the wording was not right there.
and the sync to a server is more robust from what I read in the forum.