But Iâm lucky I at least had that! See, it turns out that I was not the only person who had this problem, with some saying it was a deep inconvenience. Google literally convinced numerous people to use this tool to log into their accounts, uploaded a botched update that prevented a number of people from logging into their accounts in a secure fashion, and didnât bother to update with a fix for four whole days. Some of them were left begging for a fix.
I initially thought this was a Samsung issue, and because Google doesnât have, like, a phone number that you can call, I spent hours on the phone on Saturday basically trying to reach someone on the technical support lines I could accessâboth T-Mobile and Samsungâto inform them that they have a botched update for an essential application hanging out on the Google Play store.
This was not easy. I had to explain to T-Mobile that no, I was not going to delete this app and lose all of my logins, and to Samsung that yes, this is their problem even if they didnât make the app themselves. This was a frustrating process, but T-Mobile seemed to take it seriously enough that they called me back multiple times to check in on the problem. (Google, itâs been 25 years, youâve made your point; open up a damn customer support line already.)
The thing is, two-factor authentication is growing in importance as a way of securing identity. At work, I have to log into a second factor, using my phone, just to access my applications. Numerous other applications are reliant on second-factor authentication. Google itself is starting to require people to use two-factor to log into their Google account (which, fortunately, does not require Authenticator). Applications like GitHub are also moving to require two-factor authentication.
I guess what Iâm trying to say is that this should just work, and despite that, Google just let this essential tool hang around for a whole weekend, not letting people log in.
We shouldnât settle for thatânot when itâs our security on the line.