PrivateBin
PrivateBin is a minimalist, open source online pastebin where the server has zero knowledge of pasted data. All pastes are encrypted and decrypted in the browser using 256-bit AES, so the hosting server never sees the plaintext content. It is a modern fork of the classic ZeroBin project, designed to run in any PHP environment with no database and almost no dependencies.
Key Features
- Zero-knowledge encryption — Pastes are encrypted in the browser with 256-bit AES before they ever reach the server; the server stores only ciphertext
- No database required — Pastes are stored in flat files, making deployment and backups trivial
- Expiring and self-destructing pastes — Set a burn-after-reading flag or a time limit so sensitive content disappears automatically
- Discussion and comments — Optional per-paste comment threads using the same client-side encryption
- Syntax highlighting — Built-in highlighting for code and markdown support
- Multi-language UI — Interface translated into dozens of languages
- Theme support — Light, dark, and custom colour schemes
- Practical security features — IP-based rate limiting, brute-force protection, and optional file upload support
Why Use PrivateBin?
PrivateBin is one of the most trusted privacy tools in the open source community. Because encryption happens entirely in the browser, even a compromised or malicious server operator cannot read your pastes. It deploys on shared hosting in minutes — no database, no Composer dependencies, just PHP — which makes it the default choice for self-hosted secure paste sharing.
Use Cases
- Sharing passwords, API keys, and other secrets with colleagues without exposing them to server logs
- Publishing code snippets that should not be indexed by search engines
- One-time transmission of sensitive information that should self-destruct after reading
- Running a private pastebin for a team or community on minimal hardware
Platform
Linux · macOS · Windows (any environment with PHP 7.4+)
Licence
Zlib/libpng