Google Testing New Method For Making Passwords Irrelevant

Of course, if you lose your phone or no longer want to use it for signing into a Google account on another device, you can still use a traditional sign-in process.

Google is testing a new authentication feature that could make your smartphone the key to your online accounts when signing in to other devices like a tablet or laptop. It’s secure in that you need your phone with you to access your account, and you need to confirm each time you try to get in.

Reddit user Rohit Paul was invited to test the feature, which still requires some user input.

Unfortunately, passwords are not going away altogether, Google also saying they’ll be kept around just for those cases where it sees unusual activity coming from user accounts, like a high number of failed login attempts. Google often tests out features with select groups before giving a wider audience access.

The ultimate aim is to make accounts more secure even if someone were to use a weak password, and Google will apparently make users perform extra tasks if there is ever reason to suspect their account is being abused.

If the user clicks yes, he’ll be presented three codes, and he’ll have to tap the one that’s also shown on his screen. Instead of entering an email and a password to login, users only have to type in their email. A confirmation is then sent to your phone, and you can complete the log in process by tapping the Yes button that appears.

Since Google hasn’t announced the feature, the details on how this works are still unknown. However, users can still use their password if their phone is dead or otherwise inaccessible.