Microsoft Authenticator to stop storing new June 1 passwords.
UPDATE, May 4, 2025: This story, originally published on May 2, has been informed with more information about the use of Passkeys by Microsoft, as well as details of special password management applications, as password management features are removed from the official Authenticator application.
What about Microsoft Passwords? This is the question that many will ask as a series of password -related announcements. Passwords suddenly disappear from Windows accounts. Expired passwords have long been used to unlock Windows accounts and attackers use passwords to compromise Microsoft’s accounts. Now, to add to the confusion of credentials, Microsoft has warned users of the Authenticator application that, since June 1, will no longer be able to store new passwords. I guess I would try to answer this question “what to good” …
What about Microsoft Authenticator application?
The Microsoft Authenticator app was more than a 2FA code generator for quite some time now. Indeed, many would argue that it has been gradually placed as the default password administrator for Microsoft users. What is able to store passwords and self -healing on Android and iOS platforms. But this password home, dear reader, is going to collapse as Microsoft announces a dramatic shift in the emphasis from the app to the browser.
Microsoft has confirmedStarting in June, the huge changes in the way the Authenticator application works.
These changes are part of a Microsoft move to rationalize the automatic password process on all devices. In June, users of the Microsoft Authenticator application will no longer be able to store new passwords. In July, Microsoft will abolish the use of Autofill in the application and since August, “your saved passwords will no longer be accessible to authentication,” Microsoft said. However, the app will continue to support the stakes and Microsoft has advised that “if you have set the clinics for your Microsoft account, make sure Authenticator checks remains enabled as a Passkey provider”. If you turn off the authentication, you will also turn off your stakes.
So what now? Microsoft really wants to embrace the Edge browser’s password management functionality, stating that “Saved passwords (but not the password history created) and your addresses are safely synchronized with your Microsoft account and you can continue accessing them and enjoying them and enjoying them and enjoying them. Edge ”.
Why do Microsoft users move to Passkeys?
Passkey technology is not something new that has just appeared by the ether, although the slow and painful journey into provider activation and the acceptance of the user makes it look like that. In fact, the initiative started first in 2012 with the Fido Alliance Foundation, backed by Apple, Google and Microsoft. To understand why they are safer than passwords that better ask someone for who is the main part of their professional life? Someone like Steve Won, who, as head director of products with Password Manager 1Password, knows something or two about technology. “Each Passkey consists of two keys – a unique public key, created and stored on the company server and a private key, which is stored on the user’s device,” Won explained. Because the public key is used to create a challenge that can only be solved by the private key, the Won continued, “Passkeys are almost impossible for hackers to guess or watch because the keys are accidentally produced and never shared during the connection process.”
You can have a gym yourself and use the simple key simulator as a demo at passkeys.io, if you are still convinced of how easy it is to develop and use. I recommend it seriously, there is no return as soon as you try and see on your own.
As for Microsoft, this is the reason to publicly confirm that it wants to move every user away from the weak world of security represented by inheritance passwords and to a brave young and much stronger, one of the Passkeys. Sangeeta Ranjit, team product manager and Scott Bingham, main product manager with Microsoft’s Identity and Management Team and the access management team, really made it clear. “There is no doubt about this, the time of the password is over,” they said, “bad actors know it,” Microsoft recommended, “so they are desperately accelerating the password -related attacks while they still can.”
For Windows 11 users, said Katherine Holdsworth, Microsoft team manager, will mean that you will be able to “navigate to a site that supports Passkeys and be asked to choose how to store your Passkeys”. Proper support for third -party Passkey providers using an application planning interface means that passwords, such as 1password and Bitwarden, will allow users to connect directly to the Windows 11 platform. What does this mean? Users will be able to use “the same passage in Windows 11 you have created on your mobile device,” Holdsworth said.
Microsoft Authenticator was never a genuine password manager – start using an app that is
Let’s be honest here, the Authenticator Microsoft application was never a password manager in the acceptable sense of the word. ITV was an authentication application that created code, that’s it. Certainly, Microsoft added some bells and whistles along the way, but you can’t turn a bush into a Christmas tree by only adding the pagi. I am sure I will hit some wings here, but the pure browser -based browsers are not suitable password managers. I can understand why Microsoft wants people to use the Edge browser as if it were, of course, but the argument of the bush and tinsel still apply if you replace the bush with something else than a genuine Christmas tree.
Here’s the thing: There is no real reason to use your browser in this way when a special application code application can not only automatically automatically automatically automatically automatically, but can also support the keys and create 2FA codes, thank you very much.
S someone who made the transition from a Microsoft Windows and the Google Android ecosystem to Apple One for my main work use a few years ago, I can warmly recommend the Apple password app. This existing connection management provided by the Keychain iCloud, synchronizes on all devices, creates codes and supports Passkeys 2FA. It is free to use and compete very nicely with other passwords, provided that you are using Apple platforms and you do not want many additional features except for the basic basic credentials management elements. If you want a little more through additional enclosures and cross-hitforms, then I would like to recommend 1password, which I use with my Windows and Android devices. It is not free, but it is full of features and is a long -standing player in the industry, which means that you can trust your codes and data with it, regardless of the operating system or machine you are in. Other passwords are available, of course, and I will encourage you to do your own research to find the best it meets your needs and price point.
