Passkeys: Better authentication for the internet!

Justpass
4 min readJul 13, 2023

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The internet has a Password problem!! The average user has as many as 100 passwords, and most of us use the same password (or a couple of them) to log-in to most services. We’ve all been there. Compromising security for convenience, we put our personal information at risk with poor password habits. One in four Americans use common passwords — like Abc123, Password1111, and P@ssw0rd. Sixty-six percent of Americans admit to using the same weak password across multiple sites, which makes all those accounts vulnerable. And every day, new data breaches publicly expose millions of usernames and passwords.

With every app update, security breach, password update or forced account creation, we are reminded of how painful and inconvenient the process of creating, memorizing, synchronizing passwords is.

So why are we still relying on passwords?

Passwords are the symptom of a bigger problem — our early failure to identify and verify user identities into the internet from the outset. Many consider knowledge-based credentials (passcodes, PINs, passwords) is one of the early sins of the internet.

We’ve been trying to plumb and hack and patch the holes ever since, and passwords have simply been the least bad option, allowing us to secure one account at a time. The alternatives — VPN and hardware tokens, phone-based authentication, biometrics — have either not worked as well as billed, or been economically feasible.

Phone-based authentication, which heavily relies on phone calls and SMS messages, is inherently linked to the user’s phone number. This connection makes it alarmingly simple for someone to manipulate or hack a cellular network, rerouting the phone number. Consequently, this allows malicious individuals to intercept messages and calls, facilitating fraudulent authentication.”

The path forward: FIDO or Passkeys

Fast Identity Online (FIDO) is an authentication standard, created by Google, Apple, Microsoft, that is designed to replace passwords with a simpler user friendly phishing-resistant security

With FIDO Authentication, users sign in with phishing resistant credentials, called passkeys. Passkeys can be synced across devices or bound to a platform or security key and enable password-only logins to be replaced with secure and fast login experiences across websites and apps.

Passkeys are more secure than passwords and SMS OTPs, simpler for consumers to use, and easier for service providers to deploy and manage.

How does it work?

The FIDO protocols use standard public key cryptography techniques to provide stronger authentication. During registration with an online service, the user’s client device creates a new key pair. It retains the private key and registers the public key with the online service. Authentication is done by the client device proving possession of the private key to the service by signing a challenge. The client’s private keys can be used only after they are unlocked locally on the device by the user.

The FIDO protocols are designed from the ground up to protect user privacy. The protocols do not provide information that can be used by different online services to collaborate and track a user across the services. Biometric information, if used, never leaves the user’s device.

DEMO:

Try it here https://demo.justpass.me/ or watch the video below.

How Justpass’s passkey solution improves your conversion rate today!

Passkeys are the newest growth hack to improve the conversion rate and user retention of any e-commerce or SaaS company, while saving on dev costs. To quickly obtain these benefits without thinking of complex integration or cross-device issues, just make use of JustPass authentication solution that puts passkeys at the heart. Integrate within minutes, AB test it without any risks in parallel to your existing authentication solution and transition your users smartly into the passkey era. Trust me, your users will love it (and your conversion rate will prove it).

Start your passkey journey for free today!

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