this post was submitted on 22 Mar 2024
32 points (92.1% liked)

Privacy

32120 readers
544 users here now

A place to discuss privacy and freedom in the digital world.

Privacy has become a very important issue in modern society, with companies and governments constantly abusing their power, more and more people are waking up to the importance of digital privacy.

In this community everyone is welcome to post links and discuss topics related to privacy.

Some Rules

Related communities

much thanks to @gary_host_laptop for the logo design :)

founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
 

I‘ve been using unique passwords and totp for some time but I get uneasy whenever I use my phone as a mfa. The reason is the worry about losing it and potentially getting locked out of my accounts.

Searching for best practices didnt help so far. Thats why I turn to you.

So far I have my password vault and my phone with an authenticator app. I may have stored two backup codes somewhere but I wouldnt find them, ever. Especially not in panic mode.

Since mfa should actually not be on the same device or at least require different things (password and biometrics) I dont think using the totp of my vault is a great idea, right? Or only if I configured the mfa to ask for a pin while the passwords ask for biometrics or something.

If I did this I‘d still lose everything if the vault got lost but thats what backups are for. This solution does not include the mfa (or backup key) to my vault though.

Ideally, I would put it in an actual vault but so the single point of failure probabilities keep increasing.

Any pros here that solve these binds regularly? Whats the best practice? Is there a 3-2-1-backup equivalent?

Edit: btw here is what I found. The encrypted text on paper idea is pretty good but seems very complex. https://security.stackexchange.com/questions/76464/best-practices-for-usefully-storing-two-factor-authentication-backup-codes

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] haui_lemmy@lemmy.giftedmc.com 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Thanks for chiming in! Non-electronic and secure are going to be interesting things to consider, especially in combination.

Bank safe isnt totally out of the question but I would like to avoid them if I can. Second location wouldnt be impossible but offline doesnt mix in well with that since my family is a mess.

If one was to make a hobby out of this I can imagine peeps putting their secrets in plain sight but make them uninteresting for the uninitiated.

[–] LostXOR@fedia.io 2 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (2 children)

You could encrypt the backup codes with a strong password using something like AES, then print the encrypted data out in hexadecimal or base64.

[–] astrsk@kbin.social 2 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Honestly this would make for a neat project — build an esp32 or rp2040 based punchcard reader / printer and then print out all your backup codes (encrypted of course by some hardware based code like a set of dip switches) onto custom punchcard tape.

[–] haui_lemmy@lemmy.giftedmc.com 2 points 8 months ago

Neat! Now we‘re talking! :))

Jk, but this is actually pretty cool.