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Google will now make passkeys the default for personal accounts (arstechnica.com)

submitted 2 years ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

180 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Passkey is some sort of specific unique key to a device allowing to use a pin on a device instead of the password. But which won't work on another device.

Now I don't know if that key can be stolen or not, or if it's really more secure or not, as people have really unsecure pins.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 years ago (1 children)

But it becomes much easier if you want to compromise a specific target individual

[–] [email protected] -1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

No, not really.

Even if you want to target a specific user, it doesn't become necessarily easier.

Unless you happen to target an individual that combines good password OpSec with shitty phone OpSec.

But I would expect those to be a minority.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Hi, yes, I am that minority

I have a 37 character password with both cases, numbers and special characters to login to my pw vault using long random strings

My phone has a swipe pattern lock since that is the safest lock option it allows in the first place. I wish I could lock it better, but the only other options available to me are a 4 character pin, and fingerprints/facial scan. I hope the problems with those are obvious

Couple that with the fact that I have a daily predictable commute in public transit where I have a habit to put my phone next to me during breakfast and you have a recipe for disaster.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 years ago (2 children)

You can still use a 37 character password to protect your passkeys in your pw vault, so it's not like anyone is forcing you to change.

It's still a single factor though. The number of times I have had to lecture IT admins that their 64 character passwords was compromised by a keylogger and that they need to move towards MFA is too damn high.

As for your phone, if that's sufficient for you, go for it.

There are better phones out there.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 years ago

Even FIDO2 MFA doesn’t protect you from attacks that involve malware running on your machine. If there was a keylogger on their machine then that machine is likely compromised in other ways, and any credentials entered or stored on it should be considered compromised and should be reset.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 years ago (2 children)

I have MFA in addition to that pw, yes

There are better phones out there.

That's news to me. Which other mobile authentication is there besides pin, pattern, facial and fingerprint?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 years ago

Most phones allow passwords, or at least longer length pin.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 years ago

My 6 character alphanumeric pin is more secure than your four digit numeric