The novelties of Android 14 are just beginning to make themselves known, but some are already interesting. The latest: native support for passkeys in third-party applications. Password manager Dashlane today announced native support for passkeys in a future version of the app.
Already pushed by Apple, passkeys could well put an end to passwords. More secure and more practical to use, they have every chance for the moment. Google seems to want to follow suit with native support for passkeys in third-party apps, given the first Developer Preview of Android 14 released last month. The opportunity for password managers to get started with passkeys on our Android smartphones, like Dashlane.
What would passkeys be used for on Android 14?
As a reminder, passkeys are an alternative to classic passwords. A “pass keyis an identification key associated with an identifier and is fully encrypted twice, one on the identification server side, the other on the user’s device. When you want to connect to a service, you don’t send a passkey directly, but a token that is generated automatically and from the latter. The operation may resemble in some respects authentication applications such as Google Authenticator or Microsoft Authenticator.
Several large digital companies are now looking at this authentication solution, which could eventually replace passwords. These access keys can be activated through their smartphone’s facial recognition, their laptop’s biometric sensor, a code, a pattern, etc.
In the first preview version of Android 14 dedicated to app developers, Google added native passkey support for third-party apps. This will allow password managers to create and use passwords on smartphones.
Dashlane will natively integrate passkeys on our smartphones
In a blog post published on March 1, Dashlane states that it wants to add passkeys in a future version of its Android application. On how this will be possible, Dashlane writes that “The user can simply create an access key using their fingerprint instead of entering a password. The fingerprint ties the authentication action to the device user, which prevents anyone else from creating and using passkeys on that specific device.“In addition to that, the password manager posted a short video on Twitter “demoto show what it might look like.
Manage passkeys with Dashlane on Android later this year 🎉 #fido #passkeys #passwordless pic.twitter.com/myFKDPAYF7
— Dashlane (@dashlane) February 23, 2023
In reality, it wouldn’t change much for the user, since the Dashlane window that will open will look very similar to what we know today, especially with Google’s password manager. Dashlane seems to believe it and even adds that the passkeys “are phishing-resistant credentials based on FIDO standards and represent the future of online authentication“.
For its part, 1Password also works on passkeys. In a blog post published almost a month ago, this other password manager also announced the future support for access keys, without specifying whether this will be the case on Android 14 (the system of operation just beginning its test phases).
At the moment, the final version of Android 14 is scheduled for next August. This support by third-party applications is a good thing since it will mean that Google will no longer be the only entity that can manage and store our access keys on our Android smartphones.
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