Passwords that must be constantly created, remembered, and changed may soon be a thing of the past. Passkey is replacing them—an authentication method for signing into accounts without a password, using Face ID, fingerprints, or scanners on devices. Passkeys are based on WebAuthn, which enables storing access data directly on the device. This makes it practically impossible to steal or forge such keys. In addition, passkeys protect against phishing: the system simply won’t work on a spoofed site.
Passkey technology is being actively adopted by Apple, Google, and Microsoft. It is already supported by 48% of the top 100 global websites. Facebook has added passkey sign-in to its mobile app, Microsoft includes passkey support by default, simplifying the sign-in process for users, and sales of Google’s Titan key for passwordless access have reached 22 countries.
Against the backdrop of the latest leak involving more than 16 billion records from publicly available databases, switching to passkeys could become one of the key steps for protecting personal data. Another significant advantage: after a vacation, there won’t be the usual message to IT support, “Help, I forgot my password!” The new password is simply your fingerprint or face.
