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> With the way things are going (U2F/WebAuthn), Yubikeys are being commoditized, and that's a good thing. I very much doubt this. Security keys are only used b
by imiric 4y ago
> With the way things are going (U2F/WebAuthn), Yubikeys are being commoditized, and that's a good thing.
I very much doubt this. Security keys are only used by a very niche community of security minded tech geeks. They're either unknown or very user unfriendly and a nuissance to the vast majority of tech users. Hell, I only use them because not using them is not an option, but I'm constantly annoyed with having to _think_ about them, rotate keys, manage passwords, etc.
While WebAuthn and passkeys are becoming more prevalent and standardized, and that's certainly a good thing, the future of increased security for everyone will not involve security keys. Most users will authenticate using their phone or biometric data, which will create passkeys for each purpose, stored securely in the background on a TPM-like device, and synced using traditional methods.
So security keys will remain a niche product, for those of us who don't trust these new authentication models, or have to keep managing passwords for likely many years to come.
- stavros 4y agoI meant "it doesn't matter which key you get, they're all the same", not "everyone has one".
- imiric 4y agoAh, sorry for misunderstanding. BTW, that's a pretty cool project embedding a Solo 2 into the laptop. Shame you're now stuck with the Framework, but it's awesome that kind of project is even possible. I still prefer using a regular smartcard, since some (many?) laptops have built-in readers. And I miss PCMCIA slots, which were a perfect fit for smartcard readers, until they took it away from us. :(
- stavros 4y agoOh I'm not stuck, it's a removable port, I can just take the key out whenever. I think USB-C is more flexible than PCMCIA, especially with the Framework's module bays.
- imiric 4y agoWell, you're functionally stuck with Framework, unless you want to go back to using the security key in the traditional way. I have the same issue with ThinkPads because of the TrackPoint, and can't go back to other laptops for work (some HP models had it at one point, but I haven't seen it in recent ones). And, sure, USB killed PCMCIA, but I still prefer the embedded form factor and standard size of PC cards. Now we have a million USB devices, all with different form factors, and even different behavior depending on the USB standard they support. At least we've sort of settled on a single connector now.