Apple Joins FIDO Alliance Committed to Eliminating Use of Passwords

Apple has just joined the FIDO Alliance, an open industry association seeking to replace password-only logins with secure login experiences across websites and apps using the WebAuthn standard, which allows users to log in on websites and apps using a public key cryptographic “authenticator” instead of a password (via ZDNet).

Rolf Lindemann, the co-chair of FIDO’s Security Requirements Working Group, said that Apple still trails other companies in terms of security and authentication. “Currently, there is full FIDO support in three major platforms: Google Android and Chrome, Microsoft Windows and Edge, and Mozilla Firefox,” he said.



Lindemann believes that now that Apple is getting a first-hand look into where FIDO is heading, it can help direct it.

“Some organizations have been hesitant to deploy FIDO because there was no [major] public commitment from Apple to FIDO. Now with the addition of Apple, all major platform vendors in the FIDO Alliance prove that the world is finally ready for this technology.”

In December last year, Apple added native support for FIDO-compliant security keys, such as the YubiKey, using the WebAuthn standard over near-field communication (NFC), USB, or Lightning with the release of iOS 13.3.