Comment by xvilka

My Google account is in good standing but has other issues. In between startups and side projects I cannot link my phone number as it has been used "too many times". So apparently, to Google, if I want a new account or to set this up, I need a new phone number. Enquiries to support have gone as well as you'd expect with Google.

> A centralized identification system on that scale in the US would take generations to get up and running

Cultural pushback has so far prevented such a system from being created. I hope that continues but am not optimistic.

And then there's the problem of undocummented / illegal immigrants that the US has, which nevertheless can often get some state services and have enough ID to pass by. Because it's a political issue, nobody can either legalize or deport them without getting into the political quagmire that is immigration reform.

In functioning ID systems (and not having or wanting one is a valid political position which both the US and the UK took) this is not an issue.

I live in Poland, and we force rotating IDs on a (staggered) 10-year schedule, just so we can slowly upgrade them and introduce new features like these.

If the scan also included a picture, that was signed with your private key, then it would be harder to spoof.

I've experienced this "solved problem" when visiting Germany during COVID. On every entrance to a mall there was somebody with a scanner device, and they only let you in if the scanner showed a green mark. I've been fully vaccinated (not EU) but my code didn't show a green mark on their scanner and I was promptly denied entry. The solution was to show them my German friend's code on my phone, this registered just fine, so I could enter anywhere.

So the whole "eID/CAs/ZKP/PKI" mumbo jumbo can be easily fooled by a gif file.

You’re conflating the real life need of ID, with trust in the organisation.

Sorry. Wrong.

The only times I had to provide a scan of my passport was to cross a border:

    - get a VISA to be allowed to cross the border
    - send to the airline for my flight that will cross the border
    - show the real passport at the border

I have another ID for authentication inside my country, which by the way, is not a driving license (which is used only for car driving usage).

In my experience, hotels in other countries also take a copy of the passports of all guests.

Also learned “know your customer” laws require US people to give passport + SSN to a foreign bank who then reports it back to the US. Given that such bank’s website involves disabling right-click for “security”, the only glimmer of hope is that the data is catastrophically lost due to stupidity before it can be compromised.

IDs being required for voting is essentially a poll tax the way that it's argued for in the US. There's a minimum amount you have to spend to even get one that will expire in a certain amount of years.

That's also assuming you can get all the documents you need for the initial ID. If you don't already have all the essential documents you'll need multiple appointments at government facilities. The local social security office usually has just one location. Mine required time off from work because they were open from 10 till 4 four days a week. This was just part of the process to get an ID for a child when we only had a copy of a couple documents instead of the originals.

Getting an ID for my grandma who made the mistake of being born black in the rural South during Jim Crow was a year long process, since she didn't even have originals of most of the documents. It took that long and was handled by one of her children that was a lawyer. For her we were getting an ID so the family could take her traveling, years before it was turned into a political issue to disenfranchise people.

Nobody arguing for the ID laws ever argues for raising their taxes for an ID that all citizens are guaranteed with the supporting infrastructure. They're arguing for it because they know people they don't want to vote will have trouble getting one

The difficulty for the US is people seem to be against a Federal Government ID. India doesn't seem to have this stigma and hence rural India can solve this problem.

It is a problem for millions of Americans: https://voteriders.org/article/who-doesnt-have-an-id-in-amer...

Systemic racism is very much a thing, and while perhaps not foundational in this particular issue, we see still see political fuckery that definitely targets by race: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2026-election/tarrant-count...

"India does it!" is not the absolute proof of a lack of racism that you believe it is.

For multiple reasons.

every application packet for a US National Security clearance for twenty years, was stolen in bulk, by Chinese agents. Your characterization of the perfection of US Federal data management appears to be lacking nuance.

I don't mean the services I mean the governments.

Yes, you can. Either you can physically own the key on the physical device (i.e. Yubikey/Google Titan/HSM) or you can use software (KeepassXC, Bitwarden).

Most operating systems and browsers come with a sync mechanism that many people default to, but it's no more than that: the default.

As for account recovery, most websites have a way to recover your account when you lose your password, there's no reason why that wouldn't work for passkeys. Every website with passkey access I've used so far makes passkeys optional and forces you to set a password already. If they switch their default to passkeys and add a password as an optional step, nothing would change.

My passkey is synched with iCloud which has all hardened settings set to on, so if I switch devices (I have) its seamlessly. You can also export Passkeys is my understanding but I have not tried it.

When I'm on non-Apple I can scan a QR code on my phone and it will validate it the same way, using bluetooth to send enough info to the target computer to get me logged on.

> think with passkey you don't own the private key. It's in your device and managed by the OS. That's one of the reasons I don't use passkeys (the other being that if I lose the device I can't access my account)

It is not true. You can move passkeys between OSs if you have a password manager or an OS that has this ability. For example, I store my Passkeys in iCloud Keychain and I have them synced on all my Apple devices.

There are cases though, where the website can force the requirement of a device bound passkey, but that is something it is not very likely you will encounter.

My passkeys are in my self-hosted Vaultwarden. If I can't put them there, I don't use them.

It's not all sunshine and roses, though. Despite having Bitwarden set as the only passkey provider in my Android setup, the phone persistently only offers me Google. Which is empty, because as I said, I won't use one tied to things I can't control. Works great on desktops, though.

Passkeys can theoretically require you to be on hardware, I haven't found anything yet that requires that.

I think you can do passkeys wile having private key. When os has the private key its just more convenient way of doing passkey.

I don´t think I've ever come across a service that only used passkeys. Username/email + password + 2FA is usually the primary form of verification. There's usually a way to recover your account through email.

You can, with for example KeePassXC. But following passkey development it does seem that in time they will want Google or Apple to own your private key and for you to use it through them.