Open Bitdefender Safepay in its own screen or window.

Just switched from Kaspersky to Bitdefender. I have a desktop with 2 screens and when I do my banking I have in one screen a browser opened with my online banking and in the other any billing sites, PDFs or any other information that I want available at the moment. When using Safepay, I can only see the one online banking tab and nothing else, making it frustrating going back and forward in order to obtain the information needed, by the way Kaspesky has a safe browser feature as well but you can use it without hiding everything else. I do understand the reasons why Bitdefender blocks everything else (no need to get an answer followed with all the Safepay features from Scott), but I would like to know if there is any way possible to open Bitdefender Safepay in its own screen or window, and if not, PLEASE add that option in the settings so we as individual users can decide on how we want to use your product that suits our needs in the best or most efficient way.

Or if you aren't planning this, at least add more features to Safepay, I can only open one window with multiple tabs, make it possible to open a second window so I can utilize both screens.

Also, anytime I open the banking site and Safepay launches, the site also opens outside the virtual desktop and then I have to close it, fix it so the site opens only in Safepay.

I hope this sheds some light on some issues and we can hope for an improved Safepay.

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  • Hello.

    Safepay opens ONLY in full screen.

    You can't resize the window or even open Safepay in split screen.

    Also, you can only switch between the Safepay full screen and the desktop screen.

    You can add the banking site as bookmark in Safepay, by following these steps:

    Just make sure Encrypted web scan option is turned ON. To find it, go to Protection > click on the Settings button in the ONLINE THREAT PREVENTION module, then make sure the ENCRYPTED WEB SCAN slider is set to ON(blue). If this feature is off, the website may not be detected by Safepay as a banking website, therefore it won't be automatically opened in Safepay.

    Finally, you can share your suggestion(s) for the product, by contacting Bitdefender Consumer Support by chat, telephone or e-mail:

    Chat is the fastest way to get in touch with Bitdefender Consumer Support.

    NOTE: Bitdefender telephone support is not toll-free!

    Regards.

  • Alexandru_BD
    Alexandru_BD admin
    edited June 2023

    Hi @DTsag and thank you for sharing your thoughts here. First of all, a warm welcome to Bitdefender and the Community!

    I have moved your thread to our Product Features & Ideation category, as the content is best suited for this. As @Gjoksi explained above, this is how Safepay was designed to function. The product teams will analyze your suggestion to decide if this is something that can be done during future developments.

    In regard to opening the banking site in Safepay only, this can be done, as per the above instructions.

    Thank you once again for your valuable feedback and contribution! 👍️

    Regards,

    Alex

    Premium Security & Bitdefender Endpoint Security Tools user

  • I'm one month new with Bitdefender after recently leaving Kaspersky (by the way, not for cost or performance reasons). I'm on the same page as DTsag regarding the limitations of SafePay. It makes using it very cumbersome. Bitdefender's answers only confirm how it works with no explanation as to why it's better. Is it because their process is safer or because they haven't refined the program? I would also like to see SafePay function more like Kaspersky's Safe Money in the future.

  • Scott
    Scott ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited July 2023

    Hi @DubBaa

    As to why it's better, see if any of these bullet points help to answer that question.

    From this article.

    Features

    Bitdefender Safepay offers the following features:

    • It blocks access to your desktop and any attempt to take snapshots of your screen.
    • It protects your secret passwords while browsing online with Password Manager.
    • It comes with a virtual keyboard that makes it impossible for hackers to read your keystrokes when used.
    • It is completely independent of your other browsers.
    • It comes with a built-in VPN to be used when your computer is connected to unsecured Wi-Fi networks.
    • It supports bookmarks and allows you to navigate between your favorite banking/shopping sites.
    • It is not limited to banking. Any website can be opened in Bitdefender Safepay.


    Kind regards,

    Scott

    All Bitdefender Home Product User Guides: https://www.bitdefender.com/consumer/support/user-guides/

  • Agree with DTsag. This makes Safepay useless when entering payee details from an invoice. I had hoped to add my email to Safepay so I could open that in a tab to see invoice details, but Safepay won't allow this.

  • Comment above is a bit harsh, apologies. I work with two monitors, Safepay blocks both. Switch to Desktop is cumbersome, but does work if I moved the invoice to the primary screen, and at least cut and paste from Desktop to Safepay works. An enhancement I'd like is for Safepay to not block the extended screen but rather leave what was on there displayed.

  • Hi @phnelth don't worry about it and thanks for joining us here. I think maybe @camarie can help us out with a bit more context regarding this? I know he's been working on a couple of Safepay initiatives, so he can provide a more advised opinion. Let's wait for his expertise.

    Regards,

    Alex

    Premium Security & Bitdefender Endpoint Security Tools user

  • camarie
    camarie BD Staff
    edited June 13

    @phnelth It's how is implemented. Without getting in too much gory details, Safepay is a self-shielded environment from the outside world. This is why it opens in a separate desktop, for example - if some s.c.r.i.p.t. or print screen or keylogger attempts to hook a window from the default desktop, it cannot do it in another desktop. Also the print screen is intercepted and disabled in safepay as well, virtual keyboard renders a keylogger unusable etc.

    So from the security standpoint it was created as an isolated environment. I understand that there are scenarios where another webpage or document can be opened in the default desktop, and thus making the payment a back-and-forth desktop switch, which is, indeed, not very straightforward.

    Now to make Safepay open in the same desktop will strip out a number of security advantages. If such an implementation (i.e. some option saying "Open Safepay in a separate desktop", default ON as is now, but with the possibility to let the user to switch it to OFF and thus opening Safepay in the same desktop) will be done, I won't hide this will be quite an implementation, and will require basically to (re)work and retest everything. Most likely it won't be very high on the list of emergencies to do, although it is an important idea. If something like this would be done, it would need to run similarily with a virtual machine (like VirtualBox, VMware, Hyper-V etc.) which will need to still deter print screens, disable mouse and keys to/from other programs etc. This will not be an easy implementation, trust me.

    A few words about the comparison with SafeMoney. While such a comparison is normal, it is not comparing the same set of features. What SafeMoney does it to protect the network data exchange by verifying the website certificates, analyzing the website addresses if they are malware or not - something both the product (via the https scan) and Safepay (using its own analyzing of the navigated address and certificates) already does. But this comparison it does not take into account multiple other features, like, for example, Safepay is basically always in incognito mode, its storage is deleted at start (and end) of a session; its storage is protected being directly inside the product; is not using another browser, which in turn have extensions, plugins etc. which might intervene in the traffic, while Safepay actively disables any extension (not counting its own Password Manager, which is also loaded from a controlled location directly and not loaded from some other expose location).

    But points taken. I will think on this and try to produce a proof of concept, and if that works, I will demonstrate it to the team and perhaps it will make it into such a feature update. I cannot guarantee now a timeline - or even a succes on releasing such a thing - but at least I can promise I will try to make it work. That is, among the (hundreds of) other things on my to do list.

  • I'm impressed that a software company took my suggestion seriously and also took the time to respond. Thanks for that