Barclays also issue bluetooth gizmo that you need to put your card into to access business accounts. I had to set one up for our accounts person. It's tied to the .EXE wih your account details as far as I can see.
Obviously no Linux version. Which isn't a problem since our finance team are Windows exclusively. However if the CEO ever had to use it, they'd have to either provide a Linux version, or lose the account.
Or a Mac version or *I* won't use it. All this forcing us to have apps on our phones won't end well. When my iPhone 6S expires, I shall be replacing it with a simple clam-shell device from the likes of Doro. No apps, so the car-parking companies (amongst others), can sod off.
Yes, I have a NatWest one also that works just fine with my Barclays card.
I won't be installing any app, or other software on my Mac, just to satisfy PatientAccess.
However it looks like you don't need to if you use the NHS login.
Which is all well and good, until you need to do something at lunch, using your work computer, where you cannot install an app and phones have no signal or are not permitted at all (due to a camera ban).
I've worked in places where you are not permitted to take in a camera, which also rules out almost all mobile phones - and certainly all Smart ones.
Oh, I forgot the place that had offices and a main site - where no mobile phone company covered both!
Well, I'm a Linux user and know that I can use 2FA on my laptop if required. What I won't do is anything involving an android mobile phone (SMS PIN notification excepted), Microsoft, and/or Google. As is mentioned in The Register article Jethro linked to upthread, the main reason for introducing passkeys is for the Big Players to have yet another system for turning us into data they can use or sell.
Hmm. I'm already there having decided I didn't want the likes of Google permanently looking over my shoulder. I rarely park in public places so have yet to hit a site with *apps* only. Bank access with a card reader is tedious but simple providing you work from home.
>
you don´t need a signal. Its totally standalone.
Dave
MacOS's built in Keychain will do TOTP.
That's another option.
Theo
You can get TOTP tokens with no connectivity and no camera - they are set up by NFC:
Really, the only "app" you needs is a browser.
However it's "apps" (and their in flight ads) that make the money for the OS suppliers, Google and Apple.
If you've spend a few days on a sizeable companies helldesk, you will suddenly appreciate the cure for forgotten passwords ...
Exactly. My wife doesn't keep her phone near her PC, and she's sick of having to get up and find it just so that she can log in to one of her work accounts.
It's possible to extract the 'secret' (Google, anyway) from the phone. I wrote her a short shell script that gives her the current code. OK, she has to switch from her Windows machine, but that's just a button on the KVM.
My wife has only a Doro clam-shell.
When two factor authentication rears its head (at least once an evening with her, but often several times during a single evening) the One Time Code is sent to the land line. She then unearths herself from all the clutter around her chair, tries to avoid tripping over all that clutter, staggers across the room to the phone whilst clutching her laptop, and tries to decipher the automated voice which reels off the OTC (there is a single repeat) and...
Hints like: "Keep the cordless phone (not the phone with the curly cable which she insists on using) by your chair so you don't have to get up." don't work. "Why don't I get you a smart phone." _certainly_ doesn't work.
For some reason, I am to blame for all the problems she has with 'modern stuff' - yet any suggestions about how these problems can be mitigated get a hostile reception.
So you have to plan ahead, instead of just using a password when you suddenly decide you need to do something at lunchtime?
Divorce sometimes is blissful. I remember one GF on the first time trying to find my house rang up and said 'I'm lost' .
I said 'where are you?'
The retort ' I said I am lost, so how should I know?' was less than helpful.
If you work in a facility where no mobiles are allowed, then you have to plan ahead for many things anyway (like you could keep your TOTP card in your wallet/locker or whatever). If mobiles are allowed, then you can use a TOTP app on your phone - it doesn't need signal.
Theo
I've worked in places where mobiles are allowed, but cameras are not. With an old, non-smart phone (or on a desk phone), I could receive a call from my wife, asking me to sort out an urgent payment that needed to be done and use the office computer to do it. I'd not know in advance that I would need to do it that day. Carrying a printed TOTP seems a major security risk ... like writing down your passwords.
Only for people who haven't got the wit to have a system to encode it in writing.
Just inverting the case of all the letters would produce a TOTP that could be safely written down and totally useless if intercepted.
Have something to add? Share your thoughts — no account required.
Ask the community — no account required