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66-702: Web Authentication ( WebAuthn ) is a web standard published by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). WebAuthn is a core component of the FIDO2 Project under the guidance of the FIDO Alliance . The goal of the project is to standardize an interface for authenticating users to web-based applications and services using public-key cryptography . WebAuthn credentials (which are themselves FIDO credentials) that are available across multiple devices are commonly referred to as passkeys . On

132-589: A Trusted Platform Module (TPM). Sensitive cryptographic operations can also be offloaded to a roaming hardware authenticator that can in turn be accessed via USB , Bluetooth Low Energy , or near-field communications (NFC). A roaming hardware authenticator conforms to the FIDO Client to Authenticator Protocol (CTAP), making WebAuthn effectively backward compatible with the FIDO Universal 2nd Factor (U2F) standard. Like legacy U2F, Web Authentication

198-613: A website , a web browser , and an authenticator: WebAuthn specifies how a claimant demonstrates possession and control of a FIDO2 authenticator to a verifier called the WebAuthn Relying Party. The authentication process is mediated by an entity called the WebAuthn Client, which is little more than a conforming web browser. For the purposes of illustration, we assume the authenticator is a roaming hardware authenticator (see below for other options). In any case,

264-428: A WebAuthn registration flow that is similar to the authentication flow illustrated above. The primary difference is that the authenticator now signs an attestation statement with its attestation private key. The signed attestation statement contains a copy of the public key that the WebAuthn Relying Party ultimately uses to verify a signed authentication assertion. The attestation statement also contains metadata describing

330-418: A database query to return information. The notable standalone runtimes are Node.js , Deno , and Bun . The following features are common to all conforming ECMAScript implementations unless explicitly specified otherwise. JavaScript supports much of the structured programming syntax from C (e.g., if statements, while loops, switch statements, do while loops, etc.). One partial exception

396-480: A dedicated JavaScript engine that executes the client code . These engines are also utilized in some servers and a variety of apps . The most popular runtime system for non-browser usage is Node.js . JavaScript is a high-level , often just-in-time compiled language that conforms to the ECMAScript standard. It has dynamic typing , prototype-based object-orientation , and first-class functions . It

462-578: A desire in the flourishing web development scene to remove this limitation, so in 1995, Netscape decided to add a programming language to Navigator. They pursued two routes to achieve this: collaborating with Sun Microsystems to embed the Java language, while also hiring Brendan Eich to embed the Scheme language. The goal was a "language for the masses", "to help nonprogrammers create dynamic, interactive Web sites ". Netscape management soon decided that

528-494: A device. The first Security Level 2 certified FIDO2 key, called "Goldengate" was announced one year later by eWBM on 8 April 2019. Dropbox announced support for WebAuthn logins (as a 2nd factor) on 8 May 2018. Apple announced that Face ID or Touch ID could be used as a WebAuthn platform authenticator with Safari on 24 June 2020. WebAuthn implements an extension of the W3C's more general Credential Management API , which

594-435: A grassroots coalition fighting for improved web standards support in browsers. The web standards movement supports concepts of standards-based web design, including the separation of document structure from a web page or application's appearance and behavior; an emphasis on semantically structured content that validates (that is, contains no errors of structural composition) when tested against validation software maintained by

660-520: A new security device to an existing account) while the get() method is used for authenticating (such as when logging in). To check if a browser supports WebAuthn, scripts should check if the window.PublicKeyCredential interface is defined. In addition to PublicKeyCredential , the standard also defines the AuthenticatorResponse , AuthenticatorAttestationResponse , and AuthenticatorAssertionResponse interfaces in addition to

726-452: A stand-alone JavaScript runtime system. As of 2018, Node had been used by millions of developers, and npm had the most modules of any package manager in the world. The ECMAScript draft specification is currently maintained openly on GitHub , and editions are produced via regular annual snapshots. Potential revisions to the language are vetted through a comprehensive proposal process. Now, instead of edition numbers, developers check

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792-485: A unique per-account "user handle" identifier, which older authenticators are unable to store. One of the first FIDO2-compatible authenticators was the second-generation Security Key by Yubico, announced on 10 April 2018. The first FIDO2-compatible authenticators with a display was Trezor Model T by SatoshiLabs, announced on 6 November 2019. Trezor Model T was also the first authenticator that allowed users to select which FIDO2 resident credential should be used directly on

858-473: A variety of dictionaries and other datatypes. The API does not allow direct access to or manipulation of private keys, beyond requesting their initial creation. In August 2018, Paragon Initiative Enterprises conducted a security audit of the WebAuthn standard. While they could not find any specific exploits , they revealed some serious weaknesses in the way the underlying cryptography is used and mandated by

924-886: A variety of other software systems, both for server-side website deployments and non-browser applications . Initial attempts at promoting server-side JavaScript usage were Netscape Enterprise Server and Microsoft 's Internet Information Services , but they were small niches. Server-side usage eventually started to grow in the late 2000s, with the creation of Node.js and other approaches . Electron , Cordova , React Native , and other application frameworks have been used to create many applications with behavior implemented in JavaScript. Other non-browser applications include Adobe Acrobat support for scripting PDF documents and GNOME Shell extensions written in JavaScript. JavaScript has been used in some embedded systems , usually by leveraging Node.js. A JavaScript engine

990-520: A white paper in which he coined the term Ajax and described a set of technologies, of which JavaScript was the backbone, to create web applications where data can be loaded in the background, avoiding the need for full page reloads. This sparked a renaissance period of JavaScript, spearheaded by open-source libraries and the communities that formed around them. Many new libraries were created, including jQuery , Prototype , Dojo Toolkit , and MooTools . Google debuted its Chrome browser in 2008, with

1056-484: Is multi-paradigm , supporting event-driven , functional , and imperative programming styles . It has application programming interfaces (APIs) for working with text, dates, regular expressions , standard data structures , and the Document Object Model (DOM). The ECMAScript standard does not include any input/output (I/O), such as networking , storage , or graphics facilities. In practice,

1122-530: Is scoping : originally JavaScript only had function scoping with var ; block scoping was added in ECMAScript 2015 with the keywords let and const . Like C, JavaScript makes a distinction between expressions and statements . One syntactic difference from C is automatic semicolon insertion , which allow semicolons (which terminate statements) to be omitted. JavaScript is weakly typed , which means certain types are implicitly cast depending on

1188-455: Is a software component that executes JavaScript code . The first JavaScript engines were mere interpreters , but all relevant modern engines use just-in-time compilation for improved performance. JavaScript engines are typically developed by web browser vendors, and every major browser has one. In a browser, the JavaScript engine runs in concert with the rendering engine via the Document Object Model and Web IDL bindings. However,

1254-416: Is a lingering misunderstanding among users that biometric data is transmitted over the network in the same manner as passwords, which is not the case. When the WebAuthn Relying Party receives the signed authentication assertion from the browser, the digital signature on the assertion is verified using a trusted public key for the user. To obtain a public key for the user, the WebAuthn Relying Party initiates

1320-517: Is a specification or set of guidelines that, after extensive consensus-building, has received the endorsement of W3C Members and the Director. An IETF Internet Standard is characterized by a high degree of technical maturity and by a generally held belief that the specified protocol or service provides significant benefit to the Internet community. A specification that reaches the status of Standard

1386-576: Is an attempt to formalize the interaction between websites and web browsers when exchanging user credentials. The Web Authentication API extends the Credential Management navigator.credentials.create() and navigator.credentials.get() JavaScript methods so they accept a publicKey parameter. The create() method is used for registering public key authenticators as part of associating them with user accounts (possibly at initial account creation time but more likely when adding

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1452-613: Is assigned a number in the IETF STD series while retaining its original IETF RFC number. HTML 5 contains numerous "willful violations" of other specifications, in order to accommodate limitations of existing platforms. There are compliance tests both for HTML code generated by websites as well as for the faithful interpretation of HTML code by web browsers. W3C offers online services to test websites directly for both web site developers, as well as for website users. These include: The Web Standards Project (WaSP), although development

1518-487: Is by far the most-used. Other notable ones include Angular , Bootstrap , Lodash , Modernizr , React , Underscore , and Vue . Multiple options can be used in conjunction, such as jQuery and Bootstrap. However, the term "Vanilla JS" was coined for websites not using any libraries or frameworks at all, instead relying entirely on standard JavaScript functionality. The use of JavaScript has expanded beyond its web browser roots. JavaScript engines are now embedded in

1584-424: Is currently a First Public Working Draft (FPWD). FIDO2 is the successor to FIDO Universal 2nd Factor (U2F). Whereas U2F only supports multi-factor mode, having been designed to strengthen existing username/password-based login flows, FIDO2 adds support for single-factor mode. In multi-factor mode, the authenticator is activated by a test of user presence , which usually consists of a simple button push; no password

1650-491: Is directly related to Java. At the time, the dot-com boom had begun and Java was a popular new language, so Eich considered the JavaScript name a marketing ploy by Netscape. Microsoft debuted Internet Explorer in 1995, leading to a browser war with Netscape. On the JavaScript front, Microsoft created its own interpreter called JScript . Microsoft first released JScript in 1996, alongside initial support for CSS and extensions to HTML . Each of these implementations

1716-489: Is officially inactive , continues to offer two levels of testing services for web browsers: JavaScript This is an accepted version of this page JavaScript ( / ˈ dʒ ɑː v ə s k r ɪ p t / ), often abbreviated as JS , is a programming language and core technology of the Web , alongside HTML and CSS . 99% of websites use JavaScript on the client side for webpage behavior. Web browsers have

1782-421: Is required. In single-factor mode, the authenticator ( something you have ) performs user verification . Depending on the authenticator capabilities, this can be: Regardless of mode, the authenticator never shares its secrets or biometric data with the website. Moreover, a single user's secret or biometric works with all websites, as the authenticator will select the correct cryptographic key material to use for

1848-472: Is resilient to verifier impersonation; that is, it is resistant to phishing attacks, but unlike U2F, WebAuthn does not require a traditional password. Moreover, a roaming hardware authenticator is resistant to malware since the private key material is at no time accessible to software running on the host machine. The WebAuthn Level 1 and 2 standards were published as W3C Recommendations on 4 March 2019 and 8 April 2021 respectively. A Level 3 specification

1914-552: Is the dominant client-side scripting language of the Web, with 99% of all websites using it for this purpose. Scripts are embedded in or included from HTML documents and interact with the DOM . All major web browsers have a built-in JavaScript engine that executes the code on the user's device. Over 80% of websites use a third-party JavaScript library or web framework as part of their client-side scripting. jQuery

1980-868: The Blue Beanie Day , inspired by Jeffrey Zeldman, who is shown with a blue cap on the book cover of his 2003 book Designing with Web Standards . Since then, the 30 November is the annual international celebration of web standards and web accessibility . When a web site or web page is described as complying with web standards, it usually means that the site or page has valid HTML , CSS and JavaScript . The HTML should also meet accessibility and semantic guidelines. Full standard compliance also covers proper settings for character encoding , valid RSS or valid Atom news feed, valid RDF , valid metadata , valid XML , valid object embedding, valid script embedding, browser- and resolution-independent codes, and proper server settings. When web standards are discussed,

2046-511: The V8 JavaScript engine that was faster than its competition. The key innovation was just-in-time compilation (JIT), so other browser vendors needed to overhaul their engines for JIT. In July 2008, these disparate parties came together for a conference in Oslo . This led to the eventual agreement in early 2009 to combine all relevant work and drive the language forward. The result was

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2112-548: The World Wide Web Consortium ; and progressive enhancement , a layered approach to web page and application creation that enables all people and devices to access the content and functionality of a page, regardless of personal physical ability (accessibility), connection speed, and browser capability. Prior to the web standards movement, many web page developers used invalid, incorrect HTML syntax such as "table layouts" and "spacer" GIF images to create web pages — an approach often referred to as " tag soup ". Such pages sought to look

2178-402: The interoperability , accessibility and usability of web pages and web sites. Web standards consist of the following: More broadly, the following technologies may be referred to as "web standards" as well: Web standards are evolving specifications of web technologies. Web standards are developed by standards organizations —groups of interested and often competing parties chartered with

2244-570: The ECMAScript 5 standard, released in December 2009. Ambitious work on the language continued for several years, culminating in an extensive collection of additions and refinements being formalized with the publication of ECMAScript 6 in 2015. The creation of Node.js in 2009 by Ryan Dahl sparked a significant increase in the usage of JavaScript outside of web browsers. Node combines the V8 engine, an event loop , and I/O APIs , thereby providing

2310-534: The United States. The trademark was originally issued to Sun Microsystems on 6 May 1997, and was transferred to Oracle when they acquired Sun in 2009. A letter was circulated in September 2024, spearheaded by Ryan Dahl , calling on Oracle to free the JavaScript trademark . Brendan Eich the original creator of JavaScript, was among the over 14,000 signatories who supported the initiative. JavaScript

2376-851: The Web Standards Project replaced bandwidth-heavy tag soup with light, semantic markup and progressive enhancement , with the goal of making web content "accessible to all". The Web Standards movement declared that HTML , CSS , and JavaScript were more than simply interesting technologies. "They are a way of creating Web pages that will facilitate the twin goals of sophisticated and appropriate presentation and widespread accessibility." The group succeeded in persuading Netscape , Microsoft , and other browser makers to support these standards in their browsers. It then set about promoting these standards to designers, who were still using tag soup , Adobe Flash , and other proprietary technologies to create web pages. In 2007, Douglas Vos initiated

2442-470: The WebAuthn Client (i.e., the browser) via JavaScript . The WebAuthn Client communicates with the authenticator using a JavaScript API implemented in the browser. A roaming authenticator conforms to the FIDO Client to Authenticator Protocol . WebAuthn does not strictly require a roaming hardware authenticator. Alternatively, a software authenticator (e.g., implemented on a smartphone) or a platform authenticator (i.e., an authenticator implemented directly on

2508-608: The WebAuthn Client Device) may be used. Relevant examples of platform authenticators include Windows Hello and the Android operating system . The illustrated flow relies on PIN-based user verification, which, in terms of usability, is only a modest improvement over ordinary password authentication. In practice, the use of biometrics for user verification can improve the usability of WebAuthn. The logistics behind biometrics are still poorly understood, however. There

2574-426: The ability to import scripts. JavaScript is a single- threaded language. The runtime processes messages from a queue one at a time, and it calls a function associated with each new message, creating a call stack frame with the function's arguments and local variables . The call stack shrinks and grows based on the function's needs. When the call stack is empty upon function completion, JavaScript proceeds to

2640-480: The authenticator is a multi-factor cryptographic authenticator that uses public-key cryptography to sign an authentication assertion targeted at the WebAuthn Relying Party. Assuming the authenticator uses a PIN for user verification, the authenticator itself is something you have while the PIN is something you know . To initiate the WebAuthn authentication flow, the WebAuthn Relying Party indicates its intentions to

2706-536: The authenticator itself. The digital signature on the attestation statement is verified with the trusted attestation public key for that particular model of authenticator. How the WebAuthn Relying Party obtains its store of trusted attestation public keys is unspecified. One option is to use the FIDO metadata service. The attestation type specified in the JavaScript determines the trust model. For instance, an attestation type called self-attestation may be desired, for which

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2772-450: The best option was for Eich to devise a new language, with syntax similar to Java and less like Scheme or other extant scripting languages . Although the new language and its interpreter implementation were called LiveScript when first shipped as part of a Navigator beta in September 1995, the name was changed to JavaScript for the official release in December. The choice of the JavaScript name has caused confusion, implying that it

2838-406: The client side, support for WebAuthn can be implemented in a variety of ways. The underlying cryptographic operations are performed by an authenticator , which is an abstract functional model that is mostly agnostic with respect to how the key material is managed. This makes it possible to implement support for WebAuthn purely in software, making use of a processor's trusted execution environment or

2904-491: The effort to fully standardize the language was undermined by Microsoft gaining an increasingly dominant position in the browser market. By the early 2000s, Internet Explorer 's market share reached 95%. This meant that JScript became the de facto standard for client-side scripting on the Web. Microsoft initially participated in the standards process and implemented some proposals in its JScript language, but eventually it stopped collaborating on ECMA work. Thus ECMAScript 4

2970-702: The following publications are typically seen as foundational: Web accessibility is normally based upon the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines published by the W3C's Web Accessibility Initiative . Work in the W3C toward the Semantic Web is currently focused by publications related to the Resource Description Framework (RDF), Gleaning Resource Descriptions from Dialects of Languages (GRDDL) and Web Ontology Language (OWL). A W3C Recommendation

3036-488: The industry from any challenges that are introduced by broken standards and the need for backwards compatibility . ECDAA was only designed to be used in combination with device attestation. This particular feature of WebAuthn is not necessarily required for authentication to work. Current implementations allow the user to decide whether an attestation statement is sent during the registration ceremony. Independently, relying parties can choose to require attestation or not. ECDAA

3102-494: The lack of a caching page layout language, made web sites "heavy" in terms of bandwidth, as did the frequent use of images as text. These bandwidth requirements were burdensome to users in developing countries, rural areas, and wherever fast Internet connections were unavailable. The Web Standards movement pioneered by Glenn Davis , George Olsen, Jeffrey Zeldman , Steven Champeon, Todd Fahrner, Eric A. Meyer , Tantek Çelik , Dori Smith, Tim Bray , Jeffrey Veen, and other members of

3168-414: The next message in the queue. This is called the event loop , described as "run to completion" because each message is fully processed before the next message is considered. However, the language's concurrency model describes the event loop as non-blocking : program I/O is performed using events and callback functions . This means, for example, that JavaScript can process a mouse click while waiting for

3234-557: The old status bar at the bottom of your old browser ." In November 1996, Netscape submitted JavaScript to Ecma International , as the starting point for a standard specification that all browser vendors could conform to. This led to the official release of the first ECMAScript language specification in June 1997. The standards process continued for a few years, with the release of ECMAScript 2 in June 1998 and ECMAScript 3 in December 1999. Work on ECMAScript 4 began in 2000. However,

3300-409: The operation used. Values are cast to strings like the following: Values are cast to numbers by casting to strings and then casting the strings to numbers. These processes can be modified by defining toString and valueOf functions on the prototype for string and number casting respectively. JavaScript has received criticism for the way it implements these conversions as the complexity of

3366-468: The previous FIDO U2F standard, included and enabled WebAuthn in Firefox version 60, released on 9 May 2018. An early Windows Insider release of Microsoft Edge (Build 17682) implemented a version of WebAuthn that works with both Windows Hello as well as external security keys. Existing FIDO U2F security keys are largely compatible with the WebAuthn standard, though WebAuthn added the ability to reference

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3432-454: The rapid growth of the early World Wide Web . The lead developers of Mosaic then founded the Netscape corporation, which released a more polished browser, Netscape Navigator , in 1994. This quickly became the most-used. During these formative years of the Web, web pages could only be static, lacking the capability for dynamic behavior after the page was loaded in the browser. There was

3498-437: The rules can be mistaken for inconsistency. For example, when adding a number to a string, the number will be cast to a string before performing concatenation, but when subtracting a number from a string, the string is cast to a number before performing subtraction. Often also mentioned is {} + [] resulting in 0 (number). This is misleading: the {} is interpreted as an empty code block instead of an empty object, and

3564-430: The same in all browsers of a certain age (such as Microsoft Internet Explorer 4 and Netscape Navigator 4), but were often inaccessible to people with disabilities. Tag soup pages also displayed or operated incorrectly in older browsers, and required code forks such as JavaScript for Netscape Navigator and JScript for Internet Explorer that added to the cost and complexity of development. The extra code required, and

3630-545: The service requesting authentication after user verification was completed successfully. A secret and biometric on the authenticator can be used together, similarly to how they would be used on a smartphone . For example, a fingerprint is used to provide convenient access to your smartphone but occasionally fingerprint access fails, in which case a PIN can be used. WebAuthn addresses by design many inherent issues in traditional password-based authentication: Like its predecessor FIDO U2F, W3C Web Authentication (WebAuthn) involves

3696-423: The standard was not subject to broad cryptographic research from the academic world. Despite these shortcomings, Paragon Initiative Enterprises still encourage users to continue to use WebAuthn but have come up with some recommendations for potential implementers and developers of the standard that they hope can be implemented before the standard is finalized. Avoiding such mistakes as early as possible would protect

3762-455: The standard. The main points of criticism revolve around two potential issues that were problematic in other cryptographic systems in the past and therefore should be avoided in order to not fall victim to the same class of attacks: Paragon Initiative Enterprises also criticized how the standard was initially developed, as the proposal was not made public in advance and experienced cryptographers were not asked for suggestions and feedback. Hence

3828-436: The status of upcoming features individually. The current JavaScript ecosystem has many libraries and frameworks , established programming practices, and substantial usage of JavaScript outside of web browsers. Plus, with the rise of single-page applications and other JavaScript-heavy websites, several transpilers have been created to aid the development process. "JavaScript" is a trademark of Oracle Corporation in

3894-575: The task of standardization—not technologies developed and declared to be a standard by a single individual or company. It is crucial to distinguish those specifications that are under development from the ones that already reached the final development status (in case of W3C specifications, the highest maturity level). The earliest visible manifestation of the web standards movement was the Web Standards Project , launched in August 1998 as

3960-499: The trust model is essentially trust on first use . The WebAuthn Level 1 standard was published as a W3C Recommendation by the Web Authentication Working Group on 4 March 2019. WebAuthn is supported by Google Chrome , Mozilla Firefox , Microsoft Edge , Apple Safari and Opera . The desktop version of Google Chrome has supported WebAuthn since version 67. Firefox, which had not fully supported

4026-506: The use of JavaScript engines is not limited to browsers; for example, the V8 engine is a core component of the Node.js runtime system . A JavaScript engine must be embedded within a runtime system (such as a web browser or a standalone system) to enable scripts to interact with the broader environment. The runtime system includes the necessary APIs for input/output operations, such as networking , storage , and graphics , and provides

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4092-402: The web browser or other runtime system provides JavaScript APIs for I/O. Although Java and JavaScript are similar in name, syntax , and respective standard libraries , the two languages are distinct and differ greatly in design. The first popular web browser with a graphical user interface , Mosaic , was released in 1993. Accessible to non-technical people, it played a prominent role in

4158-581: Was based on an ECMAScript 4 draft. The goal became standardizing ActionScript 3 as the new ECMAScript 4. To this end, Adobe Systems released the Tamarin implementation as an open source project. However, Tamarin and ActionScript 3 were too different from established client-side scripting, and without cooperation from Microsoft , ECMAScript 4 never reached fruition. Meanwhile, very important developments were occurring in open-source communities not affiliated with ECMA work. In 2005, Jesse James Garrett released

4224-641: Was mothballed. During the period of Internet Explorer dominance in the early 2000s, client-side scripting was stagnant. This started to change in 2004, when the successor of Netscape, Mozilla , released the Firefox browser. Firefox was well received by many, taking significant market share from Internet Explorer. In 2005, Mozilla joined ECMA International, and work started on the ECMAScript for XML (E4X) standard. This led to Mozilla working jointly with Macromedia (later acquired by Adobe Systems ), who were implementing E4X in their ActionScript 3 language, which

4290-662: Was noticeably different from their counterparts in Netscape Navigator . These differences made it difficult for developers to make their websites work well in both browsers, leading to widespread use of "best viewed in Netscape" and "best viewed in Internet Explorer" logos for several years. Brendan Eich later said of this period: "It's still kind of a sidekick language. It's considered slow or annoying. People do pop-ups or those scrolling messages in

4356-548: Was removed from WebAuthn Level 2 as it was not implemented by browsers nor relying parties. Web standard Web standards include many interdependent standards and specifications, some of which govern aspects of the Internet , not just the World Wide Web. Even when not web-focused, such standards directly or indirectly affect the development and administration of web sites and web services . Considerations include

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