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It's putting password management into the same basket as the device. Suppose your Apple ID gets compromised. The attacker is a jerk and decides to remote erase

It's putting password management into the same basket as the device. Suppose your Apple ID gets compromised. The attacker is a jerk and decides to remote erase your device. Then they use your account for black hat stuff and get it permanently banned, or just erase everything on iCloud too. If the password manager was a different service then you'd still have the password for that service and could get in and recover your accounts on everything else. If it isn't, where's your stuff? The device and the cloud backups are both gone because they were both tied to the same compromised account. Or you just break your phone and then realize you don't know your password. You can reset your password with your email, so now you just need your email password, which is iCloud, which is the same password. Uh oh. Whereas if your eggs aren't all in the same basket, you can get a foothold somewhere. If you use a third party email service and haven't forgotten that password, you can still get your email on another device. If your password manager backs up to a third party service or your very own Raspberry Pi, you have access using a different set of credentials than the ones you forgot.

jesseendahl 2y ago
I think you might be making some assumptions about how this stuff works without looking into it. - A lot (most?) people’s Apple Account name is actually their main email address (e.g. Gmail), so they would still control their email address even if their Apple Account was compromised. - You can still recover your Apple Account and iCloud Keychain without any devices (e.g. if phone broke like in your scenario). - Your passkeys stored in iCloud Keychain are still protected even if your Apple Account has been compromised. Source: https://support.apple.com/en-us/102195 https://support.apple.com/en-us/102195
- nottorp 2y ago
  > - A lot (most?) people’s Apple Account name is actually their main email address (e.g. Gmail), so they would still control their email address even if their Apple Account was compromised. But the login for the Gmail address is a passkey that's on the Apple account... > - You can still recover your Apple Account and iCloud Keychain without any devices (e.g. if phone broke like in your scenario). So what's the point of passkeys if you can get access to them without passkeys? > - Your passkeys stored in iCloud Keychain are still protected even if your Apple Account has been compromised. How can something be protected when the thing that controls access to it has been compromised?
  - jesseendahl 2y ago
    > But the login for the Gmail address is a passkey that's on the Apple account... A passkey is just a replacement for a password. Google (and other apps/websites) have account recovery processes for users who get locked out of their accounts. The way you get back into your Google account doesn’t change much just because you’re signing in with a passkey vs. a password. Account recovery is a problem that service providers have to solve (and do solve) regardless of whether a user authenticates to their account with a password or a passkey. > So what's the point of passkeys if you can get access to them without passkeys? Some huge benefits are: 1. They are highly phishing resistant. Unlike passwords and popular forms of 2FA (TOTP and SMS), users can’t be tricked into sending their credential to a fake/malicious server. A passkey is bound to the server domain at the time the credential is created, and your OS/browser will simply not send it to the wrong place. 2. There is no credential for attackers to steal from servers in the case of server breach. This is because only a public key is stored on the server, instead of password hashes (or worse, plaintext, if the app/website developers don’t know what they’re doing). 3. Passkeys are guaranteed to be unique and secure. The same cannot be said for passwords. Even a password manager cannot guarantee that every single credential stored in the password manager is both unique and secure. And password complexity requirements often make it a painful game of trial and error to create a secure password, even when using a password manager. 4. Because of annoying password complexity requirements, the process of creating a new password can be annoying and take up to a minute or two of fiddling around, even when using a password manager. With a passkey, the process takes as long as Face ID or Touch ID (or equivalent on other platforms) every time. Every single credential creation and authentication is a fantastic user experience (both fast and easy). I suggest watching Apple’s WWDC videos. There you will find a very very in-depth answer to this question. All of the points I’ve made above (and more) are covered in the linked videos. Move beyond passwords: https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2021/10106/ https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2021/10106/ Meet passkeys: https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2022/10092/ https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2022/10092/ Deploy passkeys at work: https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2023/10263/ https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2023/10263/ If you won’t watch any of the above then you should at least read the FAQ on passkeys on the FIDO website here, which should answer many of your questions: https://fidoalliance.org/faqs/#PasskeysFAQs https://fidoalliance.org/faqs/#PasskeysFAQs > How can something be protected when the thing that controls access to it has been compromised? This is answered in the article I already linked above. Here is the link again. About the security of passkeys: https://support.apple.com/en-us/102195 https://support.apple.com/en-us/102195 Specifically, carefully read the following sections titled “Synchronization security” and “Recovery security”. The short answer is that gaining access to the user’s iCloud Keychain contents requires more than just having access to the Apple Account.
- AnthonyMouse 2y ago
  > A lot (most?) people’s Apple Account name is actually their main email address (e.g. Gmail), so they would still control their email address even if their Apple Account was compromised. But this is an example of not putting all your eggs in one basket. An all-in Apple customer is using Apple as their main email. > You can still recover your Apple Account and iCloud Keychain without any devices This assumes that you remember your password, and that the attacker has not changed your password, and that the account has not been permanently disabled for abuse. > Your passkeys stored in iCloud Keychain are still protected even if your Apple Account has been compromised. "Protected" means someone needs more than just the iCloud account to get access to them, not that you can re-download them if you lose access to your iCloud account. It also depends on how your account was compromised. For example, if a thief observes you entering your unlock code and then steals your phone, they have the device they need to access all your passwords too.

jesseendahl 2y ago

I think you might be making some assumptions about how this stuff works without looking into it. - A lot (most?) people’s Apple Account name is actually their main email address (e.g. Gmail), so they would still control their email address even if their Apple Account was compromised. - You can still recover your Apple Account and iCloud Keychain without any devices (e.g. if phone broke like in your scenario). - Your passkeys stored in iCloud Keychain are still protected even if your Apple Account has been compromised. Source: https://support.apple.com/en-us/102195 https://support.apple.com/en-us/102195

nottorp 2y ago
> - A lot (most?) people’s Apple Account name is actually their main email address (e.g. Gmail), so they would still control their email address even if their Apple Account was compromised. But the login for the Gmail address is a passkey that's on the Apple account... > - You can still recover your Apple Account and iCloud Keychain without any devices (e.g. if phone broke like in your scenario). So what's the point of passkeys if you can get access to them without passkeys? > - Your passkeys stored in iCloud Keychain are still protected even if your Apple Account has been compromised. How can something be protected when the thing that controls access to it has been compromised?
- jesseendahl 2y ago
  > But the login for the Gmail address is a passkey that's on the Apple account... A passkey is just a replacement for a password. Google (and other apps/websites) have account recovery processes for users who get locked out of their accounts. The way you get back into your Google account doesn’t change much just because you’re signing in with a passkey vs. a password. Account recovery is a problem that service providers have to solve (and do solve) regardless of whether a user authenticates to their account with a password or a passkey. > So what's the point of passkeys if you can get access to them without passkeys? Some huge benefits are: 1. They are highly phishing resistant. Unlike passwords and popular forms of 2FA (TOTP and SMS), users can’t be tricked into sending their credential to a fake/malicious server. A passkey is bound to the server domain at the time the credential is created, and your OS/browser will simply not send it to the wrong place. 2. There is no credential for attackers to steal from servers in the case of server breach. This is because only a public key is stored on the server, instead of password hashes (or worse, plaintext, if the app/website developers don’t know what they’re doing). 3. Passkeys are guaranteed to be unique and secure. The same cannot be said for passwords. Even a password manager cannot guarantee that every single credential stored in the password manager is both unique and secure. And password complexity requirements often make it a painful game of trial and error to create a secure password, even when using a password manager. 4. Because of annoying password complexity requirements, the process of creating a new password can be annoying and take up to a minute or two of fiddling around, even when using a password manager. With a passkey, the process takes as long as Face ID or Touch ID (or equivalent on other platforms) every time. Every single credential creation and authentication is a fantastic user experience (both fast and easy). I suggest watching Apple’s WWDC videos. There you will find a very very in-depth answer to this question. All of the points I’ve made above (and more) are covered in the linked videos. Move beyond passwords: https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2021/10106/ https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2021/10106/ Meet passkeys: https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2022/10092/ https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2022/10092/ Deploy passkeys at work: https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2023/10263/ https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2023/10263/ If you won’t watch any of the above then you should at least read the FAQ on passkeys on the FIDO website here, which should answer many of your questions: https://fidoalliance.org/faqs/#PasskeysFAQs https://fidoalliance.org/faqs/#PasskeysFAQs > How can something be protected when the thing that controls access to it has been compromised? This is answered in the article I already linked above. Here is the link again. About the security of passkeys: https://support.apple.com/en-us/102195 https://support.apple.com/en-us/102195 Specifically, carefully read the following sections titled “Synchronization security” and “Recovery security”. The short answer is that gaining access to the user’s iCloud Keychain contents requires more than just having access to the Apple Account.
AnthonyMouse 2y ago
> A lot (most?) people’s Apple Account name is actually their main email address (e.g. Gmail), so they would still control their email address even if their Apple Account was compromised. But this is an example of not putting all your eggs in one basket. An all-in Apple customer is using Apple as their main email. > You can still recover your Apple Account and iCloud Keychain without any devices This assumes that you remember your password, and that the attacker has not changed your password, and that the account has not been permanently disabled for abuse. > Your passkeys stored in iCloud Keychain are still protected even if your Apple Account has been compromised. "Protected" means someone needs more than just the iCloud account to get access to them, not that you can re-download them if you lose access to your iCloud account. It also depends on how your account was compromised. For example, if a thief observes you entering your unlock code and then steals your phone, they have the device they need to access all your passwords too.