> You open your safe and you use one of the recovery codes that you wrote down when you setup 2FA.
HN rarely does humor, but when it does, it really cuts deep.
Can you really expect a typical person - including the tech-savvy ones - to keep a hastily written piece of paper for a decade or more, without losing it? My code card is clocking on a decade, I needed it only once (so far), and it's only pure luck that, in all those years, I haven't accidentally destroyed it or thrown it away.
Also: it only recently became apparent just how bad it is to lose access to your Google account. Most tech-savvy people I know don't even realize how many things in their lives are gated by that little login form. Non-tech-savvy folks? Maybe they'll figure it out in a decade, after enough people became thrust into poverty for the lack of Google 2FA recovery codes - enough many that it's as boring news story as car accidents.
HN rarely does humor, but when it does, it really cuts deep.
Can you really expect a typical person - including the tech-savvy ones - to keep a hastily written piece of paper for a decade or more, without losing it? My code card is clocking on a decade, I needed it only once (so far), and it's only pure luck that, in all those years, I haven't accidentally destroyed it or thrown it away.
Also: it only recently became apparent just how bad it is to lose access to your Google account. Most tech-savvy people I know don't even realize how many things in their lives are gated by that little login form. Non-tech-savvy folks? Maybe they'll figure it out in a decade, after enough people became thrust into poverty for the lack of Google 2FA recovery codes - enough many that it's as boring news story as car accidents.