In late September, Microsoft started rolling out a number of new features in the non-security release preview of Windows 11 22H2. Among them are a number of new security features centering around using the company"s passwordless experience.
Today in a blog post, Microsoft goes over how organizations can start to use the new passwordless improvements in Windows 11. It states:
Phish-resistant credentials like Windows Hello for Business or FIDO2 security keys are both passwordless solutions and can protect user identities by removing the need to use passwords from day one. Commercial organizations can now set the EnablePasswordlessExperience MDM policy from Intune or another MDM to enable a fully passwordless user experience on Microsoft Entra ID joined machines.
Once IT admins in an organization set up the new features, employees who sign onto their work PCs will no longer see a password option, nor will they see any way to type in a password for a service in their web browser. Instead, they will have to use the Windows Hello method. If it doesn"t work, the user does have options like signing on the web or resetting their pin they can do without having to have any IT admin help.
Speaking of the new web sign-in feature, Microsoft stated:
We are also pleased to share that we released a new web sign-in experience with the September 2023 update for Windows 11, version 22H2. The new experience is more secure, reliable, and performant—and is now available for all Microsoft Entra ID authentication methods. This will help organizations and users gradually move away from passwords in the future.
Google recently made signing in with a passkey as the default method for signing into Google personal accounts. Microsoft-owned GitHub also recently made passkey support available for all users. Today, Amazon officially revealed it was adding passkey support for signing into the retailer on web browsers and its mobile apps,