The 2026 Security Checkup ⭐
I'm not big on resolutions per se, but a new year is an obvious time to take stock and make changes. And one of the things I want to do this year is have a monthly focus when possible. So it makes sense to kick things off with a focus on ensuring that our online accounts, especially those associated with identity, payment information, and other private data, are as secure as possible.
I walked myself back to this about a month ago when I started writing a new Passkeys chapter for the forthcoming 25H2 edition of the Windows 11 Field Guide. My issues getting that out the door were great enough that I actually wrote about that in From the Editor’s Desk: A Mind is a Terrible Thing ⭐. But here's something both remarkable and troubling: I did the same thing two years earlier when I was writing about passkeys and other security-related topics for that book's 23H2 update and went down a rabbit hole with no bottom. So I guess I'm like Sisyphus when it comes to security, doomed to repeat the events of the past over and over.
Me going through this repeatedly is partly about how my brain works: I'm a set-it-and-forget-it kind of person, and once I've figured out how to correctly configure things that don't need constant monitoring or adjusting, I move on. I wish I didn't have to keep going through this every two years, of course, but the outcome is worth the effort. Most view security as overly-complex and inconvenient, and in many cases it's so daunting that people give up. And when it comes to security in this connected era, giving up is not the answer.
Security is a big topic, and I am inarguably not an expert. But then again, I have a lot of experience figuring this out, and I can at least communicate what I've learned and, as important, what I do. Yes, I make mistakes, too, but each is its own form of learning, and if my mistakes help others, too, great. I feel like I'm in a good space with this topic now. As good as I can be given my technical, but also general, focus.
As noted, this started because of passkeys. A few years ago, Microsoft added basic support for passkeys to Windows 11, and that triggered 2023/2024's rabbit hole. This past year, it expanded that functionality with what I am calling support for external passkey managers, meaning the Microsoft Password Manager that's integrated into Microsoft Edge and third-party passkey managers, all of which are password managers (or what should be called identity managers). To date, there are only two, 1Password and Bitwarden, but I expect others in time as well.
The ways in which one can use passkeys in Windows 11 now are legion, as we say, which explains why I ran into so many issues getting what should have been a simple and short book chapter complete over the past month. And that's odd because a PC isn't where most people will encounter passkeys most of the time. As a modern alternative to passwords, one that will soon be a modern replacement for passwords, passkeys are ...
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