Passwordless logins are becoming more popular for users as it is an easier and quicker way. There are many services that offer passkey access, but some have limited support like 1Passkey. Fortunately for Android users, the company announced that it's adding support for the OS.
1Password for Android
The company announced that it is finally supporting passkeys for Android devices, allowing both smartphones and tablets to utilize the password manager, given that it runs Android 14 or later. It's important to not that the passkeys will only be working on apps.
For now, 1Password still doesn't support browsers like Chrome for Andoid. However, Google is reportedly building a new API that will soon allow passkeys on mobile browsers for Android devices, as reported by Engadget.
For iOS users, they won't have to wait as the feature is already well established for Apple products. 1Password has ,ade passkeys available for iOS 17 and iPadOS 17 back in September, and it already supports iOS browsers like Chrome and Safari.
To use the password manager, users will have to download the app and choose to use a passkey instead of a password when making an account. After that, secure passkeys can be used without having to type passwords.
Are Passkeys Safe?
It's reasonable to doubt the effectiveness and safety of passkeys. After all, passwords are complication by design so that only the owner of the account will be able to open them. Even by those mechanics, passkeys might still be the safer method of logging in.
Passkeys are a passwordless way of unlocking accounts and devices, much like fingerprint scans and face IDs. In a way, the passkeys serve as a puzzle piece that both the site and your device holds. The two parts are needed to authenticate a login, meaning that only you can use it.
Unlike passwords, passkeys are not at risk of being acquired through phishing attacks conducted by threat actors. Since there are technically no characters to type, hackers will not also be able to guess or use brute-force attacks to open your account.
It's also effective for people who have several account that uses various passwords, as users will not have to remember them all anymore. It;s easy to get locked out of an account the moment one forgets their passwords.
They are automatically generated, so the user won't have to think of character combinations that would be hard to guess. Since it support two-factor authentication, as per Keeper Security, there's an extra layer of security in the passwordess method.
The only downside is that since passkeys are still not widely adopted and are relatively new, some sites and apps still do not have support for them. A lot of mainstream apps and devices to support passkeys by now such as Apple, Google, PayPal, Microsoft, Adobe, and more.
While passkeys and its basic functions are considered to be safer than the standard password, it is advisable to still use two-factor authentication if it's an optional feature for the password manager of your choice.
