Company
Date Published
Author
Brad McCarty
Word count
563
Language
English
Hacker News points
4

Summary

In response to the increasing vulnerabilities associated with traditional passwords, passkeys have emerged as a more secure and user-friendly alternative. While passwords are often challenging to manage and remember, leading to poor security practices like recycling or writing them down, passkeys offer a solution by leveraging public-key cryptography. This technology, supported by major tech companies like Microsoft, Google, and Apple, uses a combination of public and private keys, with the private key remaining secure and only accessible upon verifying the user's identity through methods like fingerprints, facial recognition, or PINs. This approach not only simplifies the login process by eliminating the need for memorizing complex passwords but also significantly enhances security, as demonstrated by systems like Windows Hello and Apple’s FaceID, which utilize passkeys for authentication.