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I'm very bearish on Passkeys as a concept. As a technologist and security advocate, I'm glad that it helps to defeat phishing attacks, and the problem of reusing passwords/credential stuffing. But the UX is just not there yet. I jumped on the hype train and set up Passkeys for my Google account using 1Password, from Chrome on my iPhone. At some point, the enrolment procedure "failed", that is to say, my passkey was set up, but I didn't know it, so I repeated the procedure. This meant I had two "identical" passkeys for Google in my 1password, and two passkeys to which to sign into Google. Neither Google nor 1password had any way to distinguish which key was which. There's no export functionality (yes, I understand this is by design). There's no (user facing) key IDs. So, my choices were: accept that I have two passkeys, and never know which is which; risk deleting one or the other, or abandon the whole notion and go back to hardware 2FA. This doesn't even get into the mess of:
* browser based passkeys: what if I switch computers or phones? Now I have the "yubikey problem (have 3 so you can safely lose 1)" for every single device I own.
* hardware security tokens (Yubikey): in the case of Google, they aren't accepted as a "sign-in" passkey, only a "verification" passkey. However, a browser passkey is accepted. Do I need hardware 2FA? Do I need a password? I have no idea. Let's be clear. There are absolutely solutions to all of the above. I am certain I made bad assumptions or mistakes here. But I also have been using computers with a bent towards security for my entire life. If I can't get this right, how is the average user being pushed to go "passwordless" on eBay going to deal with this mess in 3 years? If you're a company considering implementing this, I'd be taking a very hard look at the ongoing support costs dealing with confused and panicked users locked out of their accounts. |
The reason I'm bullish is because all of the entrenched tech players are pushing them. The reason I think it's terrible is because the entire concept is dangerous. It's "one thing you have" (a key) that can attest to your identity. Whether or not that's attesting for you or against you is yet to be seen and I'd bet the farm on against.
As soon as tech companies have the ability to force you into using some type of device for authentication and authorization, I think the floodgates will open on abuse. It's a huge building block on the road to ensuring people never own anything, because per-use access can easily be gated now, and I think that's why big tech wants it so bad. They're going to get "a cut" for doing the auth, so why not, right?
It doesn't matter if tech enthusiasts resist either. We've seen the same story play out over and over. Developers gave Apple the keys to the kingdom for app distribution and rolled over as Adobe started charging subscriptions for desktop software. As soon as enough uninformed users accept what they're being pushed, it'll become a requirement and your options will be capitulation or exclusion.
Consider whether or not you'd want the right to use your car tied to a passkey that contacts the manufacturer, attests to your identity (authentication), and needs to get a token (authorization) before it'll start. People would never tolerate a password requirement to start their car, but a Passkey that's built in (ex: to a phone or watch) and works OTA via the cell network will easily be sold as good security, but it's really just to benefit the company leasing you the car because they can revoke access at any time.