this post was submitted on 02 Jul 2024
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Adversary-in-the-middle attacks can strip out the passkey option from login pages that users see, leaving targets with only authentication choices that force them to give up credentials.

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[–] CaptObvious@literature.cafe -4 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (14 children)

Wait, haven’t some sources been touting how ultra-secure and unbreakable passkeys are? And now we find that they’re susceptible to comparatively simple MITM attacks?

[–] xyguy@startrek.website 18 points 5 months ago (12 children)

This is just someone siting in the middle and modifying a page not to show the passkey login option anymore and then stealing a password/session token.

As far as I can tell, this has almost nothing to do with passkeys specifically and would only apply in a situation where a website has a username and password fallback in case a passkey isn't created or isnt working.

[–] CaptObvious@literature.cafe -3 points 5 months ago (3 children)

If The Next Big Thing can be sidelined by simply blocking its login option, that’s a problem. Not only is it not secure, it’s not even reliably usable.

[–] xyguy@startrek.website 2 points 5 months ago (1 children)

This is more like triple bolting the door but leaving a window open. There's nothing inherently wrong with the door, its still secure but you can bypass the secure option with a less secure method.

[–] CaptObvious@literature.cafe 2 points 5 months ago

Arguably, it’s more like someone is able to hide the door altogether and force you to climb through the less-well-secured window. The fact that they can hide the door at all makes its locks meaningless.

I get that this is an inherent problem of security mechanisms in general and not of passkeys in particular. But it still reduces passkeys to just fancy passwords. They’re obviously not any more reliable in practice.

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