Initially introduced as “Venture Confirm” in 2018, ZenKey was meant to be a single sign-on system, much like the sign up with Google or Apple buttons that you just see on varied web sites. The concept was that every service would provide an app that would confirm your identification, then act as a go everytime you went to log right into a supported web site or perform one thing like a financial institution switch. In concept, it may very well be safer as a result of it used knowledge out of your SIM card and site to ensure it was actually you attempting to log in.

It doesn’t seem to be ZenKey acquired very far although, and now it’s largely disappeared. LightReading experiences that the web site for it’s down, AT&T stopped supporting it final 12 months, and the “ZenKey powered by Verizon” app is now not accessible in app shops (no less than within the US). T-Cell’s web site appears to have virtually no references to the system so far as Google can discover, although there’s one article from mid-2020 on its enterprise website that mentions it.

To those that are accustomed to the historical past of multi-carrier joint ventures, this end result isn’t essentially a shock. LightReading referred to as it when the service was introduced in 2019, working the headline “Meet ZenKey: Telcos’ Doomed Single Signal-On Service.” The Verge’s Dieter Bohn referred to as ZenKey “the best thought from the unsuitable corporations” when he wrote in regards to the Cross-Service Messaging Initiative that tried to exchange SMS with the then-burgeoning RCS. He primarily based his opinion on previous merchandise like SoftCard, which aimed to compete with Google Pockets and Apple Pay. (It succeeded about in addition to CCMI did, which is to say under no circumstances — although it in all probability didn’t assist that when it launched in 2013 it was referred to as “ISIS,” a reputation that was about to imply one thing very unhealthy to lots of people).

In the long run, the usefulness of a service like ZenKey goes to depend on how a lot third-party help it will get — even when your app is nice, most individuals aren’t going to hassle with it if they’ll solely use it to log in to 3 or 4 websites. And why would builders add ZenKey to their websites when there are different choices from the likes of Google, Apple, Amazon, and Meta, which all have their very own single sign-on resolution with accounts individuals already use? These would additionally seemingly have significantly better model recognition when a person hits a login web page.

Working example: listed below are all of the websites and apps that labored with ZenKey in July 2022, based on a Wayback Machine archive of its now-defunct web site:

A press launch from late 2020 mentions that different corporations like Proctorio and DocuSign had “plans to trial or go reside” with help for the service, but it surely looks like that didn’t precisely work out.

Even when the cell carriers (predictably) weren’t in a position to do away with passwords, I do hope that they finally develop into a factor of the previous. However eliminating them would require a a lot tougher push from a a lot greater group; maybe passkeys, a FIDO-powered passwordless authentication system pushed for by Apple, Google, Microsoft, and the like, will find yourself being the factor. However until it turns into broadly adopted (which isn’t precisely for positive), we’ll seemingly be caught with the patchwork of profitable single sign-on choices, password managers, and scattered sticky notes we all know we shouldn’t use however do anyhow.