GitHub to require 2FA on accounts by October 6, 2023

Xylight (Photon dev)@lemmy.xylight.dev to Technology@lemmy.ml – 395 points –
Raising the bar for software security: GitHub 2FA begins March 13
github.blog

I personally am fine with this.

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Google Auth works just fine. The standard for app generated 2FA is, well, standard. They're only listing a non-complete list of options for people that don't know what an authenticator app is and need to get one for the first time.

The google auth which transmits your totp code in plaintext to there servers?

That is the specific app the person I replied to was asking about, so yea. Would have been a little weird if I was talking about some other app.

do all authenticators work for all services?

Mostly. The 6 digit standard ones that you see almost everywhere are standard TOTP codes and most apps work for them. There are some proprietary things out there too but you typically see those with a matching app from the same company. Those are far less common though so for practical reasons you can assume they are all interchangeable.

Those values are computed separately what the app is really storing is just the input values which are then combines with the current time to create the 6 digit code. That means that keeping that input value (seed) safe is a big deal, and how and where that is done is one of the major differentiators between the various options.