Why am I being asked for a Passkey? How do I turn off passkeys?

Hey Rob!

Hopefully you get this. I am having an infuriating issue where Windows forces my browsers to ask for a passkey. Except the passkey isnt my passkey, and then when I try to cancel it freezes my browser and I can't do anything. The really weird part is that it only seems to do it with accounts I almost never use, tonight it is Yahoo Sports. Both in Firefox and Chrome I try to login to yahoo and it prompts me for a usb key security, which I don't now nor have ever owned. I have searched all through the settings of both web browsers, watched videos for turning off windows Hello in the browsers, etc. I am beyond frustrated, I actually want to throw my PC in the river.

How do I turn this off?

Thanks,

Dave

David, though I have no idea why you're having this problem, it's really a problem with those non-Microsoft browsers, since it's the browser you're using that generates the request to Windows to display any dialog relating to passkeys, not Windows itself.

Though it's potentially still a problem relating to the use of passkeys themselves, Windows doesn't fire that dialog for no reason, so I suspect that something exists on your PC that's making the browsers believe a passkey exists to support those websites.

This isn't the correct place to ask a new question, since the issues discussed her are general and not related to any specific troubleshooting. You can look through this thread for a post by SirBlain that claims to show how he disabled passkeys on his own Windows 10 system, though as I recall it was fairly extreme and not something most users would likely wish to do. It's also possible that post was in another thread, but maybe he'll reply to you if he sees your question to offer his solution.

As I've mentioned, I'm personally not even trying to use passkeys with Windows 10 due to the fact it has no real support for managing the keys and thus no ability to fix problems that crop up. However, in my case this only leads to an added item for my phone being displayed in the popup lists, which since I always use Windows Hello Face (IR camera) for login or verification, really doesn't create any additional issues beyond the phone being displayed.

You'd be better off creating your own new thread to trouble-shoot your issue, since then others might see it who are truly using passkeys at present and you can detail other necessary items like the version of Windows you're using, etc., that might be important to your problem.

FYI, when I initially tried to setup a passkey to login to my Amazon account long before Microsoft was advertising their use widely almost 2 years ago, I did manage to get it set up on my phone, but then discovered that Amazon still requires you go through the same 2nd verification step of entering a TOTP Code sent to your phone, which is pointless since passkeys are inherently 2-Factor due to the fact it requires something you have (the phone), along with something you are (the Biometric Face or Fingerprint access to the passkey), which meant Amazon clearly didn't understand what they were doing. Only after that did I discover the inability to manage passkeys with Windows 10, which caused me to stop trying to use them until I get a Windows 11 device. IOW, nothing wrong with passkeys themselves, just implementation problems by Amazon (and likely others) along with management issues using Windows 10.

Rob

The sheer complexity of all this absolutely is the fault of Microsoft. It's absurd. Good grief. I was looking for help when I found Sir Blain's comments and after reading through multiple posts, concluding that this "community" conversation in Microsoft is a total waste of time, i simply found a way to ignore and workaround the "passkeys". I don't use "Hello" or Passkeys and do not plan to do so. The obsession with cybersecurity has really reached a point of diminishing returns. The 2-factor identification is all I use. I don't conduct any financial transactions via Windows (except inside my broker's secure server) and none of my files or communications are of any interest to anyone, I'm sure. The notion in your suggestion, Rob, to create another thread to ask more specific questions from Windows users about passkeys totally misses the point of the complaint I raised here so many months ago and the similar complaint David expressed. The passkeys topic is indeed, to quote David: "infuriating".

And I would add, it appears it's also pointless. Because I bypass the "passkey" pop-up dialog box now every time it appears. This along with several very annoying aspects of Microsoft 365 (the writer's jungle they used to call Office 365) has convinced me that Microsoft will never understand the actual needs of customers like us. We will drag this "365" ball and chain around with us until someone finally creates a clean, crisp, user-friendly alternative for basic word processing, document management, photo galleries and email that does not presume to know better than the user what he or she wants to do. The "passkeys" debacle is one more example of Microsoft's clumsy, convoluted approach to end-user needs.

Just needed to express that after the condescending nonsense you wrote to David. I'm done now. Thanks for listening.

Passkeys are immutable and hackable. This combination makes them inherently stupid. If I am forced to login with this garbage my account will be deleted as I will no longer consider it secure.

It's time to take a good look at linux. I have been fed up with Microsoft ever since they made the registry so complicated that hackers can easily hide anything in the registry. And Microsoft makes it impossible for anyone but a few real experts to understand what is being done on my computer. I have zero trust in Microsoft. Now they keep annoying me to set up passkeys. My passwords are protected by Norton Password valt and my sites are protected by dual authentication.