When evaluating authentication platforms, devs often ask:

“Is it open source?”

It’s a fair question. Transparency matters — especially for systems as sensitive as identity and access control. But open doesn’t always mean better. And closed doesn’t always mean locked down.

Let’s unpack it.

The Case for Open Source Auth

• Transparent code = trust and security audits

• Self-hosting for full data control

• Community-driven innovation

• Great for hobby projects, internal tooling, privacy-critical apps

But…

• Operational burden is high

• You’re on the hook for patching, scaling, monitoring

• Often lacks unified design (auth + authz + audit)

• Enterprise features (SSO, RBAC, compliance tooling) are gated or missing

The Case for Closed Source

• Managed services = less operational stress

• Battle-tested scalability

• Faster roadmap velocity

• Cleaner integrations and onboarding

The tradeoff: Control vs Velocity.

Where Prefactor Fits Prefactor isn’t open source — but it’s built with open principles:

• Transparent DSL you can audit and version

• Self-service CLI and test environments

• Dev-first workflows

• No lock-in logic — just logical control

We believe trust isn’t just about license types — it’s about how the platform behaves in your stack.

In the end, it’s not “open vs closed.”
It’s:

Do I trust this to be my infrastructure — now, and when I scale?

Sign up for a chat with the Founders today to find out more.