PALO ALTO, CA and STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN – June 24, 2019 – Yubico, the leading provider of hardware authentication security keys, today announced that the company is expanding the YubiKey for Lightning Preview Program to broaden access to partners and application developers interested in becoming early adopters.
The Partner Preview Program includes access to a YubiKey 5Ci preview device (formerly the YubiKey for Lightning) for development and testing, along with SDKs for both iOS and Android so organizations can unify their end-user authentication journey across all mobile platforms. The YubiKey 5Ci, which will be available later this year, delivers dual connections, with both a USB-C and Lightning connector on a single device.
With the latest addition for iOS support, the YubiKey becomes a portable root of trust across all major platforms, allowing it to be the trust anchor for the rightful owner to access services on any computer or mobile device. The concept of securely bootstrapping new devices can now finally evolve beyond using SMS and OTP codes.
Initially launched in January of this year, the YubiKey for Lightning Private Preview, though limited in participation, received an overwhelmingly positive response from iOS app developers looking to integrate hardware authentication into their iOS mobile apps. Yubico has been working with industry leading applications across many different verticals and geographies, including but not limited to 1Password, Brave browser, Dashlane, DoD PKI Purebred, Keeper Security, Monkton, LastPass, Secmaker, XTN, and more.
Access to the YubiKey for Lightning Partner Preview Program offers several benefits for app developers when going to market. Organizations will increase brand exposure while strengthening the protection of their users’ accounts with cross-platform YubiKey support, including iOS devices. The YubiKey 5 Series supports multiple authentication protocols, including FIDO2, WebAuthn, U2F, OTP, PIV (smartcard) and OpenPGP, to support a variety of use cases allowing developers to deliver their own chosen model of integration with the YubiKey 5Ci.
“With our expansion of the YubiKey for Lightning Partner Preview Program, we are looking forward to supporting many more organizations and services who are looking to highlight their commitment to strong authentication on mobile devices,” said Jerrod Chong, Chief Solutions Officer, Yubico. “Together, we will be enabling the YubiKey to work seamlessly on iPhones, iPads, Android and all other computing systems.”
As Yubico continues to extend hardware authentication capabilities for both mobile and computer users, developers and services are invited to work with Yubico by applying for the YubiKey for Lightning Partner Preview Program to enable strong hardware authentication for iOS apps.
New YubiKey 5Ci demonstrations and previews of partner supported applications can be seen at Identiverse this week, at the Yubico booth #417.
Quotes from supporting YubiKey for Lightning Partners
Jeff Shiner, CEO at 1Password
“Earlier this month, we launched WebAuthn support in 1Password and are now supporting the upcoming YubiKey 5Ci for iOS as part of the YubiKey Lightning Private Preview Program. Hardware-based authentication provides a great extra layer of protection for 1Password customers.”
Brendan Eich, CEO and Co-Founder, Brave Software
“Security and privacy are the core values of the Brave browser. Phishing-resistant multi-factor authentication is a critical part of a resilient online ecosystem, and it’s important for us to make sure we are providing our users with the best tools to protect their private information and secure their accounts. We’re thrilled to now offer YubiKey integration with our browser. Partnering with Yubico on the Lightning Private Preview Program has given us the hardware support to take our users’ security to the next level. We’re excited to see Yubico open source their SDKs and for the program to move to the next phase.”
Emmanuel Schalit, CEO of Dashlane
“Dashlane was the first password manager to take open standards forward by adding U2F and YubiKey support for our application back in 2016. Adding support for the upcoming YubiKey 5Ci is the next progression of that journey, and we are actively working with Yubico and their developer program to continually increase the security of our customers and their passwords.”
Darren Guccione, CEO and Co-Founder, Keeper Security
“Our customers have built their trust in the security and ease of use of Keeper’s password manager. It’s important that any integration partner share our customer experience imperatives and can help deliver on them. By working to further the integration across iOS, we look forward to extending the usability of YubiKey hardware authenticators with our application on iPhones and iPads.”
Dan DeMichele, VP of Product Management, LastPass
“Multi-factor authentication is a very important step in adding an extra layer of security, especially when protecting something as critical as your password manager or single sign on account. It is imperative to us that we deliver various MFA options for every audience — from hardware security keys to mobile authenticators – to offer our users flexibility in securing access to their LastPass account. Partnering with Yubico and adding support for the new YubiKey 5Ci product on iOS enables us to provide a full solution that is in alignment with our customers’ needs.”
Harold Smith III, CEO and Co-Founder, Monkton, Inc.
“We at Monkton are extremely excited to announce upcoming support in our Rebar SDK for Yubico’s YubiKey 5Ci preview device. With expanded YubiKey capabilities on iOS, any developer using Rebar will be able to instantly use the YubiKey 5Ci for PIV for authentication and digital signing on iOS devices. This will truly enable our customers, like the US Department of Defense (DoD), to secure government data in a BYOD environment, while allowing users to seamlessly access information from shared or personal devices.”
Jonas Öholm, Senior PKI Architect, Secmaker
“For years, our customers have benefited from full PKI-based security combined with strong two-factor authentication (2FA) using our Net iD solution with the PIV-compatible YubiKey. Since then, we’ve worked closely with Yubico to implement support for the YubiKey 5Ci to extend our joint solution to the iOS platform.”
Guido Ronchetti, CTO, XTN
“The YubiKey is the Root of Trust protecting access to our customers’ critical and most sensitive data. XTN is implementing support for strong hardware-backed authentication with the YubiKey to ensure our customers have access to the best software and hardware technologies. Now, with upcoming support for the new YubiKey 5Ci, we’re making it possible for our customers to leverage a portable hardware-backed root of trust for logging into multiple devices, including iPhones and iPads.”
About Yubico
Yubico sets new global standards for simple and secure access to computers, mobile devices, servers, and internet accounts.
The company’s core invention, the YubiKey, delivers strong hardware protection, with a simple touch, across any number of IT systems and online services. The YubiHSM, Yubico’s ultra-portable hardware security module, protects sensitive data stored in servers.
Yubico is a leading contributor to the FIDO2, WebAuthn, and FIDO Universal 2nd Factor open authentication standards, and the company’s technology is deployed and loved by 9 of the top 10 internet brands and by millions of users in 160 countries.
Founded in 2007, Yubico is privately held, with offices in Sweden, UK, Germany, USA, Australia, and Singapore. For more information: www.yubico.com.
