1. Introduction
This section is not normative.
This specification defines an API enabling the creation and use of strong, attested, scoped, public key-based credentials by web applications, for the purpose of strongly authenticating users. A public key credential is created and stored by a WebAuthn Authenticator at the behest of a WebAuthn Relying Party, subject to user consent. Subsequently, the public key credential can only be accessed by origins belonging to that Relying Party. This scoping is enforced jointly by conforming User Agents and authenticators. Additionally, privacy across Relying Parties is maintained; Relying Parties are not able to detect any properties, or even the existence, of credentials scoped to other Relying Parties.
Relying Parties employ the Web Authentication API during two distinct, but related, ceremonies involving a user. The first
is Registration, where a public key credential is created on an authenticator, and scoped to a Relying Party with the present user’s account (the account might already exist or might be created at this time). The second is Authentication, where the Relying Party is presented with an Authentication Assertion proving the presence
and consent of the user who registered the public key credential. Functionally, the Web Authentication
API comprises a PublicKeyCredential
which extends the Credential Management API [CREDENTIAL-MANAGEMENT-1], and
infrastructure which allows those credentials to be used with navigator.credentials.create()
and navigator.credentials.get()
. The former is used during Registration, and the
latter during Authentication.
Broadly, compliant authenticators protect public key credentials, and interact with user agents to implement the Web Authentication API. Implementing compliant authenticators is possible in software executing (a) on a general-purpose computing device, (b) on an on-device Secure Execution Environment, Trusted Platform Module (TPM), or a Secure Element (SE), or (c) off device. Authenticators being implemented on device are called platform authenticators. Authenticators being implemented off device (roaming authenticators) can be accessed over a transport such as Universal Serial Bus (USB), Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE), or Near Field Communications (NFC).
1.1. Specification Roadmap
While many W3C specifications are directed primarily to user agent developers and also to web application developers (i.e., "Web authors"), the nature of Web Authentication requires that this specification be correctly used by multiple audiences, as described below.
All audiences ought to begin with § 1.2 Use Cases, § 1.3 Sample API Usage Scenarios, and § 4 Terminology, and should also refer to [WebAuthnAPIGuide] for an overall tutorial. Beyond that, the intended audiences for this document are the following main groups:
-
Relying Party web application developers, expecially those responsible for Relying Party web application login flows, account recovery flows, user account database content, etc.
-
Web framework developers
-
The above two audiences should in particular refer to § 7 WebAuthn Relying Party Operations. The introduction to § 5 Web Authentication API may be helpful, though readers should realize that the § 5 Web Authentication API section is targeted specifically at user agent developers, not web application developers. Additionally, if they intend to verify authenticator attestations, then § 6.5 Attestation and § 8 Defined Attestation Statement Formats will also be relevant. § 9 WebAuthn Extensions, and § 10 Defined Extensions will be of interest if they wish to make use of extensions. Finally, they should read § 13.4 Security considerations for Relying Parties and § 14.6 Privacy considerations for Relying Parties and consider which challenges apply to their application and users.
-
-
User agent developers
-
OS platform developers, responsible for OS platform API design and implementation in regards to platform-specific authenticator APIs, platform WebAuthn Client instantiation, etc.
-
The above two audiences should read § 5 Web Authentication API very carefully, along with § 9 WebAuthn Extensions if they intend to support extensions. They should also carefully read § 13.3 Security considerations for clients and § 14.5 Privacy considerations for clients.
-
-
Authenticator developers. These readers will want to pay particular attention to § 6 WebAuthn Authenticator Model, § 8 Defined Attestation Statement Formats, § 9 WebAuthn Extensions, and § 10 Defined Extensions. They should also carefully read § 13.2 Security considerations for authenticators and § 14.4 Privacy considerations for authenticators.
It is important for Web Authentication deployments' end-to-end security that the role of each component—the Relying Party server, the client, and the authenticator— as well as § 13 Security Considerations and § 14 Privacy Considerations, are understood by all audiences.
1.2. Use Cases
The below use case scenarios illustrate use of two very different types of authenticators, as well as outline further scenarios. Additional scenarios, including sample code, are given later in § 1.3 Sample API Usage Scenarios.
1.2.1. Registration
-
On a phone:
-
User navigates to example.com in a browser and signs in to an existing account using whatever method they have been using (possibly a legacy method such as a password), or creates a new account.
-
The phone prompts, "Do you want to register this device with example.com?"
-
User agrees.
-
The phone prompts the user for a previously configured authorization gesture (PIN, biometric, etc.); the user provides this.
-
Website shows message, "Registration complete."
-
1.2.2. Authentication
-
On a laptop or desktop:
-
User pairs their phone with the laptop or desktop via Bluetooth.
-
User navigates to example.com in a browser and initiates signing in.
-
User gets a message from the browser, "Please complete this action on your phone."
-
-
Next, on their phone:
-
User sees a discrete prompt or notification, "Sign in to example.com."
-
User selects this prompt / notification.
-
User is shown a list of their example.com identities, e.g., "Sign in as Alice / Sign in as Bob."
-
User picks an identity, is prompted for an authorization gesture (PIN, biometric, etc.) and provides this.
-
-
Now, back on the laptop:
-
Web page shows that the selected user is signed in, and navigates to the signed-in page.
-
1.2.3. New Device Registration
This use case scenario illustrates how a Relying Party can leverage a combination of a roaming authenticator (e.g., a USB security key fob) and a platform authenticator (e.g., a built-in fingerprint sensor) such that the user has:
-
a "primary" roaming authenticator that they use to authenticate on new-to-them client devices (e.g., laptops, desktops) or on such client devices that lack a platform authenticator, and
-
a low-friction means to strongly re-authenticate on client devices having platform authenticators.
Note: This approach of registering multiple authenticators for an account is also useful in account recovery use cases.
-
First, on a desktop computer (lacking a platform authenticator):
-
User navigates to
example.com
in a browser and signs in to an existing account using whatever method they have been using (possibly a legacy method such as a password), or creates a new account. -
User navigates to account security settings and selects "Register security key".
-
Website prompts the user to plug in a USB security key fob; the user does.
-
The USB security key blinks to indicate the user should press the button on it; the user does.
-
Website shows message, "Registration complete."
Note: Since this computer lacks a platform authenticator, the website may require the user to present their USB security key from time to time or each time the user interacts with the website. This is at the website’s discretion.
-
-
Later, on their laptop (which features a platform authenticator):
-
User navigates to example.com in a browser and initiates signing in.
-
Website prompts the user to plug in their USB security key.
-
User plugs in the previously registered USB security key and presses the button.
-
Website shows that the user is signed in, and navigates to the signed-in page.
-
Website prompts, "Do you want to register this computer with example.com?"
-
User agrees.
-
Laptop prompts the user for a previously configured authorization gesture (PIN, biometric, etc.); the user provides this.
-
Website shows message, "Registration complete."
-
User signs out.
-
-
Later, again on their laptop:
-
User navigates to example.com in a browser and initiates signing in.
-
Website shows message, "Please follow your computer’s prompts to complete sign in."
-
Laptop prompts the user for an authorization gesture (PIN, biometric, etc.); the user provides this.
-
Website shows that the user is signed in, and navigates to the signed-in page.
-
1.2.4. Other Use Cases and Configurations
A variety of additional use cases and configurations are also possible, including (but not limited to):
-
A user navigates to example.com on their laptop, is guided through a flow to create and register a credential on their phone.
-
A user obtains a discrete, roaming authenticator, such as a "fob" with USB or USB+NFC/BLE connectivity options, loads example.com in their browser on a laptop or phone, and is guided though a flow to create and register a credential on the fob.
-
A Relying Party prompts the user for their authorization gesture in order to authorize a single transaction, such as a payment or other financial transaction.
1.3. Sample API Usage Scenarios
This section is not normative.
In this section, we walk through some events in the lifecycle of a public key credential, along with the corresponding sample code for using this API. Note that this is an example flow and does not limit the scope of how the API can be used.
As was the case in earlier sections, this flow focuses on a use case involving a first-factor roaming authenticator with its own display. One example of such an authenticator would be a smart phone. Other authenticator types are also supported by this API, subject to implementation by the client platform. For instance, this flow also works without modification for the case of an authenticator that is embedded in the client device. The flow also works for the case of an authenticator without its own display (similar to a smart card) subject to specific implementation considerations. Specifically, the client platform needs to display any prompts that would otherwise be shown by the authenticator, and the authenticator needs to allow the client platform to enumerate all the authenticator’s credentials so that the client can have information to show appropriate prompts.
1.3.1. Registration
This is the first-time flow, in which a new credential is created and registered with the server. In this flow, the WebAuthn Relying Party does not have a preference for platform authenticator or roaming authenticators.
-
The user visits example.com, which serves up a script. At this point, the user may already be logged in using a legacy username and password, or additional authenticator, or other means acceptable to the Relying Party. Or the user may be in the process of creating a new account.
-
The Relying Party script runs the code snippet below.
-
The client platform searches for and locates the authenticator.
-
The client connects to the authenticator, performing any pairing actions if necessary.
-
The authenticator shows appropriate UI for the user to provide a biometric or other authorization gesture.
-
The authenticator returns a response to the client, which in turn returns a response to the Relying Party script. If the user declined to select an authenticator or provide authorization, an appropriate error is returned.
-
If a new credential was created,
-
The Relying Party script sends the newly generated credential public key to the server, along with additional information such as attestation regarding the provenance and characteristics of the authenticator.
-
The server stores the credential public key in its database and associates it with the user as well as with the characteristics of authentication indicated by attestation, also storing a friendly name for later use.
-
The script may store data such as the credential ID in local storage, to improve future UX by narrowing the choice of credential for the user.
-
The sample code for generating and registering a new key follows:
if ( ! window. PublicKeyCredential) { /* Client not capable. Handle error. */ } var publicKey= { // The challenge is produced by the server; see the Security Considerations challenge: new Uint8Array([ 21 , 31 , 105 /* 29 more random bytes generated by the server */ ]), // Relying Party: rp: { name: "ACME Corporation" }, // User: user: { id: Uint8Array. from( window. atob( "MIIBkzCCATigAwIBAjCCAZMwggE4oAMCAQIwggGTMII=" ), c=> c. charCodeAt( 0 )), name: "alex.p.mueller@example.com" , displayName: "Alex P. Müller" , }, // This Relying Party will accept either an ES256 or RS256 credential, but // prefers an ES256 credential. pubKeyCredParams: [ { type: "public-key" , alg: - 7 // "ES256" as registered in the IANA COSE Algorithms registry }, { type: "public-key" , alg: - 257 // Value registered by this specification for "RS256" } ], authenticatorSelection: { // Try to use UV if possible. This is also the default. userVerification: "preferred" }, timeout: 360000 , // 6 minutes excludeCredentials: [], // No exclude list of PKCredDescriptors extensions: { "loc" : true } // Include location information // in attestation }; // Note: The following call will cause the authenticator to display UI. navigator. credentials. create({ publicKey}) . then( function ( newCredentialInfo) { // Send new credential info to server for verification and registration. }). catch ( function ( err) { // No acceptable authenticator or user refused consent. Handle appropriately. });
1.3.2. Registration Specifically with User-Verifying Platform Authenticator
This is an example flow for when the WebAuthn Relying Party is specifically interested in creating a public key credential with a user-verifying platform authenticator.
-
The user visits example.com and clicks on the login button, which redirects the user to login.example.com.
-
The user enters a username and password to log in. After successful login, the user is redirected back to example.com.
-
The Relying Party script runs the code snippet below.
-
The user agent checks if a user-verifying platform authenticator is available. If not, terminate this flow.
-
The Relying Party asks the user if they want to create a credential with it. If not, terminate this flow.
-
The user agent and/or operating system shows appropriate UI and guides the user in creating a credential using one of the available platform authenticators.
-
Upon successful credential creation, the Relying Party script conveys the new credential to the server.
-
if ( ! window. PublicKeyCredential) { /* Client not capable of the API. Handle error. */ } PublicKeyCredential. isUserVerifyingPlatformAuthenticatorAvailable() . then( function ( uvpaaAvailable) { // If there is a user-verifying platform authenticator if ( uvpaaAvailable) { // Render some RP-specific UI and get a Promise for a Boolean value return askIfUserWantsToCreateCredential(); } }). then( function ( userSaidYes) { // If there is a user-verifying platform authenticator // AND the user wants to create a credential if ( userSaidYes) { var publicKeyOptions= { /* Public key credential creation options. */ }; return navigator. credentials. create({ "publicKey" : publicKeyOptions}); } }). then( function ( newCredentialInfo) { if ( newCredentialInfo) { // Send new credential info to server for verification and registration. } }). catch ( function ( err) { // Something went wrong. Handle appropriately. });
1.3.3. Authentication
This is the flow when a user with an already registered credential visits a website and wants to authenticate using the credential.
-
The user visits example.com, which serves up a script.
-
The script asks the client for an Authentication Assertion, providing as much information as possible to narrow the choice of acceptable credentials for the user. This can be obtained from the data that was stored locally after registration, or by other means such as prompting the user for a username.
-
The Relying Party script runs one of the code snippets below.
-
The client platform searches for and locates the authenticator.
-
The client connects to the authenticator, performing any pairing actions if necessary.
-
The authenticator presents the user with a notification that their attention is needed. On opening the notification, the user is shown a friendly selection menu of acceptable credentials using the account information provided when creating the credentials, along with some information on the origin that is requesting these keys.
-
The authenticator obtains a biometric or other authorization gesture from the user.
-
The authenticator returns a response to the client, which in turn returns a response to the Relying Party script. If the user declined to select a credential or provide an authorization, an appropriate error is returned.
-
If an assertion was successfully generated and returned,
-
The script sends the assertion to the server.
-
The server examines the assertion, extracts the credential ID, looks up the registered credential public key in its database, and verifies the assertion signature. If valid, it looks up the identity associated with the assertion’s credential ID; that identity is now authenticated. If the credential ID is not recognized by the server (e.g., it has been deregistered due to inactivity) then the authentication has failed; each Relying Party will handle this in its own way.
-
The server now does whatever it would otherwise do upon successful authentication -- return a success page, set authentication cookies, etc.
-
If the Relying Party script does not have any hints available (e.g., from locally stored data) to help it narrow the list of credentials, then the sample code for performing such an authentication might look like this:
if ( ! window. PublicKeyCredential) { /* Client not capable. Handle error. */ } // credentialId is generated by the authenticator and is an opaque random byte array var credentialId= new Uint8Array([ 183 , 148 , 245 /* more random bytes previously generated by the authenticator */ ]); var options= { // The challenge is produced by the server; see the Security Considerations challenge: new Uint8Array([ 4 , 101 , 15 /* 29 more random bytes generated by the server */ ]), timeout: 120000 , // 2 minutes allowCredentials: [{ type: "public-key" , id: credentialId}] }; navigator. credentials. get({ "publicKey" : options}) . then( function ( assertion) { // Send assertion to server for verification }). catch ( function ( err) { // No acceptable credential or user refused consent. Handle appropriately. });
On the other hand, if the Relying Party script has some hints to help it narrow the list of credentials, then the sample code for performing such an authentication might look like the following. Note that this sample also demonstrates how to use the extension for transaction authorization.
if ( ! window. PublicKeyCredential) { /* Client not capable. Handle error. */ } var encoder= new TextEncoder(); var acceptableCredential1= { type: "public-key" , id: encoder. encode( "BA44712732CE" ) }; var acceptableCredential2= { type: "public-key" , id: encoder. encode( "BG35122345NF" ) }; var options= { // The challenge is produced by the server; see the Security Considerations challenge: new Uint8Array([ 8 , 18 , 33 /* 29 more random bytes generated by the server */ ]), timeout: 120000 , // 2 minutes allowCredentials: [ acceptableCredential1, acceptableCredential2], extensions: { 'txAuthSimple' : "Wave your hands in the air like you just don’t care" } }; navigator. credentials. get({ "publicKey" : options}) . then( function ( assertion) { // Send assertion to server for verification }). catch ( function ( err) { // No acceptable credential or user refused consent. Handle appropriately. });
1.3.4. Aborting Authentication Operations
The below example shows how a developer may use the AbortSignal parameter to abort a credential registration operation. A similar procedure applies to an authentication operation.
const authAbortController= new AbortController(); const authAbortSignal= authAbortController. signal; authAbortSignal. onabort= function () { // Once the page knows the abort started, inform user it is attempting to abort. } var options= { // A list of options. } navigator. credentials. create({ publicKey: options, signal: authAbortSignal}) . then( function ( attestation) { // Register the user. }). catch ( function ( error) { if ( error== "AbortError" ) { // Inform user the credential hasn’t been created. // Let the server know a key hasn’t been created. } }); // Assume widget shows up whenever authentication occurs. if ( widget== "disappear" ) { authAbortController. abort(); }
1.3.5. Decommissioning
The following are possible situations in which decommissioning a credential might be desired. Note that all of these are handled on the server side and do not need support from the API specified here.
-
Possibility #1 -- user reports the credential as lost.
-
User goes to server.example.net, authenticates and follows a link to report a lost/stolen authenticator.
-
Server returns a page showing the list of registered credentials with friendly names as configured during registration.
-
User selects a credential and the server deletes it from its database.
-
In the future, the Relying Party script does not specify this credential in any list of acceptable credentials, and assertions signed by this credential are rejected.
-
-
Possibility #2 -- server deregisters the credential due to inactivity.
-
Server deletes credential from its database during maintenance activity.
-
In the future, the Relying Party script does not specify this credential in any list of acceptable credentials, and assertions signed by this credential are rejected.
-
-
Possibility #3 -- user deletes the credential from the authenticator.
-
User employs a authenticator-specific method (e.g., device settings UI) to delete a credential from their authenticator.
-
From this point on, this credential will not appear in any selection prompts, and no assertions can be generated with it.
-
Sometime later, the server deregisters this credential due to inactivity.
-
1.4. Platform-Specific Implementation Guidance
This specification defines how to use Web Authentication in the general case. When using Web Authentication in connection with specific platform support (e.g. apps), it is recommended to see platform-specific documentation and guides for additional guidance and limitations.
2. Conformance
This specification defines three conformance classes. Each of these classes is specified so that conforming members of the class are secure against non-conforming or hostile members of the other classes.
2.1. User Agents
A User Agent MUST behave as described by § 5 Web Authentication API in order to be considered conformant. Conforming User Agents MAY implement algorithms given in this specification in any way desired, so long as the end result is indistinguishable from the result that would be obtained by the specification’s algorithms.
A conforming User Agent MUST also be a conforming implementation of the IDL fragments of this specification, as described in the “Web IDL” specification. [WebIDL]
2.2. Authenticators
A WebAuthn Authenticator MUST provide the operations defined by § 6 WebAuthn Authenticator Model, and those operations MUST behave as described there. This is a set of functional and security requirements for an authenticator to be usable by a Conforming User Agent.
As described in § 1.2 Use Cases, an authenticator may be implemented in the operating system underlying the User Agent, or in external hardware, or a combination of both.
2.2.1. Backwards Compatibility with FIDO U2F
Authenticators that only support the § 8.6 FIDO U2F Attestation Statement Format have no mechanism to store a user handle, so the returned userHandle
will always be null.
2.3. WebAuthn Relying Parties
A WebAuthn Relying Party MUST behave as described in § 7 WebAuthn Relying Party Operations to obtain all the security benefits offered by this specification. See § 13.4.2 Security Benefits for WebAuthn Relying Parties for further discussion of this.
2.4. All Conformance Classes
All CBOR encoding performed by the members of the above conformance classes MUST be done using the CTAP2 canonical CBOR encoding form. All decoders of the above conformance classes SHOULD reject CBOR that is not validly encoded in the CTAP2 canonical CBOR encoding form and SHOULD reject messages with duplicate map keys.
3. Dependencies
This specification relies on several other underlying specifications, listed below and in Terms defined by reference.
- Base64url encoding
-
The term Base64url Encoding refers to the base64 encoding using the URL- and filename-safe character set defined in Section 5 of [RFC4648], with all trailing '=' characters omitted (as permitted by Section 3.2) and without the inclusion of any line breaks, whitespace, or other additional characters.
- CBOR
-
A number of structures in this specification, including attestation statements and extensions, are encoded using the CTAP2 canonical CBOR encoding form of the Compact Binary Object Representation (CBOR) [RFC7049], as defined in [FIDO-CTAP].
- CDDL
-
This specification describes the syntax of all CBOR-encoded data using the CBOR Data Definition Language (CDDL) [RFC8610].
- COSE
-
CBOR Object Signing and Encryption (COSE) [RFC8152]. The IANA COSE Algorithms registry established by this specification is also used.
- Credential Management
-
The API described in this document is an extension of the
Credential
concept defined in [CREDENTIAL-MANAGEMENT-1]. - DOM
-
DOMException
and the DOMException values used in this specification are defined in [DOM4]. - ECMAScript
-
%ArrayBuffer% is defined in [ECMAScript].
- HTML
-
The concepts of browsing context, origin, opaque origin, tuple origin, relevant settings object, and is a registrable domain suffix of or is equal to are defined in [HTML].
- URL
- Web IDL
-
Many of the interface definitions and all of the IDL in this specification depend on [WebIDL]. This updated version of the Web IDL standard adds support for
Promise
s, which are now the preferred mechanism for asynchronous interaction in all new web APIs. - FIDO AppID
-
The algorithms for determining the FacetID of a calling application and determining if a caller’s FacetID is authorized for an AppID (used only in the AppID extension) are defined by [FIDO-APPID].
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT", "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in [RFC2119].
4. Terminology
- Attestation
-
Generally, attestation is a statement serving to bear witness, confirm, or authenticate. In the WebAuthn context, attestation is employed to attest to the provenance of an authenticator and the data it emits; including, for example: credential IDs, credential key pairs, signature counters, etc. An attestation statement is conveyed in an attestation object during registration. See also § 6.5 Attestation and Figure 6. Whether or how the client conveys the attestation statement and AAGUID portions of the attestation object to the Relying Party is described by attestation conveyance.
- Attestation Certificate
-
A X.509 Certificate for the attestation key pair used by an authenticator to attest to its manufacture and capabilities. At registration time, the authenticator uses the attestation private key to sign the Relying Party-specific credential public key (and additional data) that it generates and returns via the authenticatorMakeCredential operation. Relying Parties use the attestation public key conveyed in the attestation certificate to verify the attestation signature. Note that in the case of self attestation, the authenticator has no distinct attestation key pair nor attestation certificate, see self attestation for details.
- Authentication
- Authentication Ceremony
-
The ceremony where a user, and the user’s client (containing at least one authenticator) work in concert to cryptographically prove to a Relying Party that the user controls the credential private key of a previously-registered public key credential (see Registration). Note that this includes a test of user presence or user verification.
- Authentication Assertion
- Assertion
-
The cryptographically signed
AuthenticatorAssertionResponse
object returned by an authenticator as the result of an authenticatorGetAssertion operation.This corresponds to the [CREDENTIAL-MANAGEMENT-1] specification’s single-use credentials.
- Authenticator
- WebAuthn Authenticator
-
A cryptographic entity, existing in hardware or software, that can register a user with a given Relying Party and later assert possession of the registered public key credential, and optionally verify the user, when requested by the Relying Party. Authenticators can report information regarding their type and security characteristics via attestation during registration.
A WebAuthn Authenticator could be a roaming authenticator, a dedicated hardware subsystem integrated into the client device, or a software component of the client or client device.
In general, an authenticator is assumed to have only one user. If multiple natural persons share access to an authenticator, they are considered to represent the same user in the context of that authenticator. If an authenticator implementation supports multiple users in separated compartments, then each compartment is considered a separate authenticator with a single user with no access to other users' credentials.
- Authorization Gesture
-
An authorization gesture is a physical interaction performed by a user with an authenticator as part of a ceremony, such as registration or authentication. By making such an authorization gesture, a user provides consent for (i.e., authorizes) a ceremony to proceed. This MAY involve user verification if the employed authenticator is capable, or it MAY involve a simple test of user presence.
- Biometric Recognition
-
The automated recognition of individuals based on their biological and behavioral characteristics [ISOBiometricVocabulary].
- Biometric Authenticator
-
Any authenticator that implements biometric recognition.
- Bound credential
-
A public key credential source or public key credential is said to be bound to its managing authenticator. This means that only the managing authenticator can generate assertions for the public key credential sources bound to it.
- Ceremony
-
The concept of a ceremony [Ceremony] is an extension of the concept of a network protocol, with human nodes alongside computer nodes and with communication links that include user interface(s), human-to-human communication, and transfers of physical objects that carry data. What is out-of-band to a protocol is in-band to a ceremony. In this specification, Registration and Authentication are ceremonies, and an authorization gesture is often a component of those ceremonies.
- Client
- WebAuthn Client
-
Also referred to herein as simply a client. See also Conforming User Agent. A WebAuthn Client is an intermediary entity typically implemented in the user agent (in whole, or in part). Conceptually, it underlies the Web Authentication API and embodies the implementation of the
[[Create]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
and[[DiscoverFromExternalSource]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
internal methods. It is responsible for both marshalling the inputs for the underlying authenticator operations, and for returning the results of the latter operations to the Web Authentication API's callers.The WebAuthn Client runs on, and is distinct from, a WebAuthn Client Device.
- Client Device
- WebAuthn Client Device
-
The hardware device on which the WebAuthn Client runs, for example a smartphone, a laptop computer or a desktop computer, and the operating system running on that hardware.
The distinctions between a WebAuthn Client device and a client are:
-
a single client device MAY support running multiple clients, i.e., browser implementations, which all have access to the same authenticators available on that client device, and
-
platform authenticators are bound to a client device rather than a WebAuthn Client.
A client device and a client together constitute a client platform.
-
- Client Platform
-
A client device and a client together make up a client platform. A single hardware device MAY be part of multiple distinct client platforms at different times by running different operating systems and/or clients.
- Client-Side
-
This refers in general to the combination of the user’s client platform, authenticators, and everything gluing it all together.
- Client-side-resident Public Key Credential Source
- Resident Credential
-
A Client-side-resident Public Key Credential Source, or Resident Credential for short, is a public key credential source that is discoverable and usable in authentication ceremonies without providing credential IDs, i.e., calling
navigator.credentials.get()
with an emptyallowCredentials
argument.As a consequence, a resident credential capable authenticator can generate an assertion signature for a resident credential given only an RP ID, which in turn means that the public key credential source is stored in the authenticator or client platform. This is in contrast to a server-side-resident public key credential source, which requires that the authenticator is given both the RP ID and the credential ID but does not require client-side storage of the public key credential source.
See also: client-side credential storage modality.
Note: Resident credentials are also usable in authentication ceremonies where credential IDs are given, i.e., when calling
navigator.credentials.get()
with a non-emptyallowCredentials
argument. - Conforming User Agent
-
A user agent implementing, in cooperation with the underlying client device, the Web Authentication API and algorithms given in this specification, and handling communication between authenticators and Relying Parties.
- Credential ID
-
A probabilistically-unique byte sequence identifying a public key credential source and its authentication assertions.
Credential IDs are generated by authenticators in two forms:
-
At least 16 bytes that include at least 100 bits of entropy, or
-
The public key credential source, without its Credential ID, encrypted so only its managing authenticator can decrypt it. This form allows the authenticator to be nearly stateless, by having the Relying Party store any necessary state.
Note: [FIDO-UAF-AUTHNR-CMDS] includes guidance on encryption techniques under "Security Guidelines".
Relying Parties do not need to distinguish these two Credential ID forms.
-
- Credential Key Pair
- Credential Private Key
- Credential Public Key
- User Public Key
- Credential Private Key
-
A credential key pair is a pair of asymmetric cryptographic keys generated by an authenticator and scoped to a specific WebAuthn Relying Party. It is the central part of a public key credential.
A credential public key is the public key portion of a credential key pair. The credential public key is returned to the Relying Party during a registration ceremony.
A credential private key is the private key portion of a credential key pair. The credential private key is bound to a particular authenticator - its managing authenticator - and is expected to never be exposed to any other party, not even to the owner of the authenticator.
Note that in the case of self attestation, the credential key pair is also used as the attestation key pair, see self attestation for details.
Note: The credential public key is referred to as the user public key in FIDO UAF [UAFProtocol], and in FIDO U2F [FIDO-U2F-Message-Formats] and some parts of this specification that relate to it.
- Credential Properties
-
A credential property is some characteristic property of a public key credential source, such as whether it is a resident credential or a non-resident credential.
- Human Palatability
-
An identifier that is human-palatable is intended to be rememberable and reproducible by typical human users, in contrast to identifiers that are, for example, randomly generated sequences of bits [EduPersonObjectClassSpec].
- Public Key Credential Source
-
A credential source ([CREDENTIAL-MANAGEMENT-1]) used by an authenticator to generate authentication assertions. A public key credential source consists of a struct with the following items:
- type
-
whose value is of
PublicKeyCredentialType
, defaulting topublic-key
. - id
- privateKey
- rpId
-
The Relying Party Identifier, for the Relying Party this public key credential source is scoped to.
- userHandle
-
The user handle associated when this public key credential source was created. This item is nullable.
- otherUI
-
OPTIONAL other information used by the authenticator to inform its UI. For example, this might include the user’s
displayName
.
The authenticatorMakeCredential operation creates a public key credential source bound to a managing authenticator and returns the credential public key associated with its credential private key. The Relying Party can use this credential public key to verify the authentication assertions created by this public key credential source.
- Public Key Credential
-
Generically, a credential is data one entity presents to another in order to authenticate the former to the latter [RFC4949]. The term public key credential refers to one of: a public key credential source, the possibly-attested credential public key corresponding to a public key credential source, or an authentication assertion. Which one is generally determined by context.
Note: This is a willful violation of [RFC4949]. In English, a "credential" is both a) the thing presented to prove a statement and b) intended to be used multiple times. It’s impossible to achieve both criteria securely with a single piece of data in a public key system. [RFC4949] chooses to define a credential as the thing that can be used multiple times (the public key), while this specification gives "credential" the English term’s flexibility. This specification uses more specific terms to identify the data related to an [RFC4949] credential:- "Authentication information" (possibly including a private key)
- "Signed value"
- [RFC4949] "credential"
At registration time, the authenticator creates an asymmetric key pair, and stores its private key portion and information from the Relying Party into a public key credential source. The public key portion is returned to the Relying Party, who then stores it in conjunction with the present user’s account. Subsequently, only that Relying Party, as identified by its RP ID, is able to employ the public key credential in authentication ceremonies, via the
get()
method. The Relying Party uses its stored copy of the credential public key to verify the resultant authentication assertion. - Rate Limiting
-
The process (also known as throttling) by which an authenticator implements controls against brute force attacks by limiting the number of consecutive failed authentication attempts within a given period of time. If the limit is reached, the authenticator should impose a delay that increases exponentially with each successive attempt, or disable the current authentication modality and offer a different authentication factor if available. Rate limiting is often implemented as an aspect of user verification.
- Registration
- Registration Ceremony
-
The ceremony where a user, a Relying Party, and the user’s client (containing at least one authenticator) work in concert to create a public key credential and associate it with the user’s Relying Party account. Note that this includes employing a test of user presence or user verification.
- Relying Party
- Relying Party Identifier
- RP ID
-
A valid domain string that identifies the WebAuthn Relying Party on whose behalf a given registration or authentication ceremony is being performed. A public key credential can only be used for authentication with the same entity (as identified by RP ID) it was registered with.
By default, the RP ID for a WebAuthn operation is set to the caller’s origin's effective domain. This default MAY be overridden by the caller, as long as the caller-specified RP ID value is a registrable domain suffix of or is equal to the caller’s origin's effective domain. See also § 5.1.3 Create a New Credential - PublicKeyCredential’s [[Create]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors) Method and § 5.1.4 Use an Existing Credential to Make an Assertion - PublicKeyCredential’s [[Get]](options) Method.
Note: An RP ID is based on a host's domain name. It does not itself include a scheme or port, as an origin does. The RP ID of a public key credential determines its scope. I.e., it determines the set of origins on which the public key credential may be exercised, as follows:-
The RP ID must be equal to the origin's effective domain, or a registrable domain suffix of the origin's effective domain.
For example, given a Relying Party whose origin is
https://login.example.com:1337
, then the following RP IDs are valid:login.example.com
(default) andexample.com
, but notm.login.example.com
and notcom
.This is done in order to match the behavior of pervasively deployed ambient credentials (e.g., cookies, [RFC6265]). Please note that this is a greater relaxation of "same-origin" restrictions than what document.domain's setter provides.
These restrictions on origin values apply to WebAuthn Clients. If other specifications mimic the Web Authentication API to make WebAuthn credentials usable on other platforms (e.g. native mobile applications), they might have different rules for binding a caller to a Relying Party Identifier. Such rules are outside the scope of this specification.
-
- Server-side-resident Public Key Credential Source
- Non-Resident Credential
-
A Server-side-resident Public Key Credential Source, or Non-Resident Credential for short, is a public key credential source that cannot be used in an authentication ceremony without providing the authenticator with the credential ID, e.g., the credential is only usable when its credential ID is specified in the
allowCredentials
argument.As a consequence, client-side storage of the public key credential source is not required for a non-resident credential. This is in contrast to a client-side-resident public key credential source, which does not require the credential ID to be provided but instead requires client-side storage of the public key credential source.
See also: server-side credential storage modality.
- Test of User Presence
-
A test of user presence is a simple form of authorization gesture and technical process where a user interacts with an authenticator by (typically) simply touching it (other modalities may also exist), yielding a Boolean result. Note that this does not constitute user verification because a user presence test, by definition, is not capable of biometric recognition, nor does it involve the presentation of a shared secret such as a password or PIN.
- User Consent
-
User consent means the user agrees with what they are being asked, i.e., it encompasses reading and understanding prompts. An authorization gesture is a ceremony component often employed to indicate user consent.
- User Handle
-
The user handle is specified by a Relying Party, as the value of
, and used to map a specific public key credential to a specific user account with the Relying Party. Authenticators in turn map RP IDs and user handle pairs to public key credential sources.user
.id
A user handle is an opaque byte sequence with a maximum size of 64 bytes, and is not meant to be displayed to the user.
- User Verification
-
The technical process by which an authenticator locally authorizes the invocation of the authenticatorMakeCredential and authenticatorGetAssertion operations. User verification MAY be instigated through various authorization gesture modalities; for example, through a touch plus pin code, password entry, or biometric recognition (e.g., presenting a fingerprint) [ISOBiometricVocabulary]. The intent is to distinguish individual users.
Note that user verification does not give the Relying Party a concrete identification of the user, but when 2 or more ceremonies with user verification have been done with that credential it expresses that it was the same user that performed all of them. The same user might not always be the same natural person, however, if multiple natural persons share access to the same authenticator.
Note: Distinguishing natural persons depends in significant part upon the client platform's and authenticator's capabilities. For example, some devices are intended to be used by a single individual, yet they may allow multiple natural persons to enroll fingerprints or know the same PIN and thus access the same Relying Party account(s) using that device. See also § 10.7 User Verification Index Extension (uvi).
Note: Invocation of the authenticatorMakeCredential and authenticatorGetAssertion operations implies use of key material managed by the authenticator.Also, for security, user verification and use of credential private keys must all occur within the logical security boundary defining the authenticator.
User verification procedures MAY implement rate limiting as a protection against brute force attacks.
- User Present
- UP
-
Upon successful completion of a user presence test, the user is said to be "present".
- User Verified
- UV
-
Upon successful completion of a user verification process, the user is said to be "verified".
- WebAuthn Relying Party
-
The entity whose web application utilizes the Web Authentication API to register and authenticate users.
A Relying Party implementation typically consists of both some client-side script that invokes the Web Authentication API in the client, and a server-side component that executes the Relying Party operations and other application logic. Communication between the two components MUST use HTTPS or equivalent transport security, but is otherwise beyond the scope of this specification.
Note: While the term Relying Party is also often used in other contexts (e.g., X.509 and OAuth), an entity acting as a Relying Party in one context is not necessarily a Relying Party in other contexts. In this specification, the term WebAuthn Relying Party is often shortened to be just Relying Party, and explicitly refers to a Relying Party in the WebAuthn context. Note that in any concrete instantiation a WebAuthn context may be embedded in a broader overall context, e.g., one based on OAuth.
5. Web Authentication API
This section normatively specifies the API for creating and using public key credentials. The basic idea is that the credentials belong to the user and are managed by a WebAuthn Authenticator, with which the WebAuthn Relying Party interacts through the client platform. Relying Party scripts can (with the user’s consent) request the browser to create a new credential for future use by the Relying Party. See Figure , below.
Scripts can also request the user’s permission to perform authentication operations with an existing credential. See Figure , below.
All such operations are performed in the authenticator and are mediated by the client platform on the user’s behalf. At no point does the script get access to the credentials themselves; it only gets information about the credentials in the form of objects.
In addition to the above script interface, the authenticator MAY implement (or come with client software that implements) a user interface for management. Such an interface MAY be used, for example, to reset the authenticator to a clean state or to inspect the current state of the authenticator. In other words, such an interface is similar to the user interfaces provided by browsers for managing user state such as history, saved passwords, and cookies. Authenticator management actions such as credential deletion are considered to be the responsibility of such a user interface and are deliberately omitted from the API exposed to scripts.
The security properties of this API are provided by the client and the authenticator working together. The authenticator, which holds and manages credentials, ensures that all operations are scoped to a particular origin, and cannot be replayed against a different origin, by incorporating the origin in its responses. Specifically, as defined in § 6.3 Authenticator Operations, the full origin of the requester is included, and signed over, in the attestation object produced when a new credential is created as well as in all assertions produced by WebAuthn credentials.
Additionally, to maintain user privacy and prevent malicious Relying Parties from probing for the presence of public key credentials belonging to other Relying Parties, each credential is also scoped to a Relying Party Identifier, or RP ID. This RP ID is provided by the client to the authenticator for all operations, and the authenticator ensures that credentials created by a Relying Party can only be used in operations requested by the same RP ID. Separating the origin from the RP ID in this way allows the API to be used in cases where a single Relying Party maintains multiple origins.
The client facilitates these security measures by providing the Relying Party's origin and RP ID to the authenticator for each operation. Since this is an integral part of the WebAuthn security model, user agents only expose this API to callers in secure contexts. For web contexts in particular, this only includes those accessed via a secure transport (e.g., TLS) established without errors.
The Web Authentication API is defined by the union of the Web IDL fragments presented in the following sections. A combined IDL listing is given in the IDL Index.
5.1. PublicKeyCredential
Interface
The PublicKeyCredential
interface inherits from Credential
[CREDENTIAL-MANAGEMENT-1], and contains the attributes
that are returned to the caller when a new credential is created, or a new assertion is requested.
[SecureContext ,Exposed =Window ]interface PublicKeyCredential :Credential { [SameObject ]readonly attribute ArrayBuffer ; [
rawId SameObject ]readonly attribute AuthenticatorResponse response ;AuthenticationExtensionsClientOutputs (); };
getClientExtensionResults
id
-
This attribute is inherited from
Credential
, thoughPublicKeyCredential
overridesCredential
's getter, instead returning the base64url encoding of the data contained in the object’s[[identifier]]
internal slot. rawId
-
This attribute returns the
ArrayBuffer
contained in the[[identifier]]
internal slot. response
, of type AuthenticatorResponse, readonly-
This attribute contains the authenticator's response to the client’s request to either create a public key credential, or generate an authentication assertion. If the
PublicKeyCredential
is created in response tocreate()
, this attribute’s value will be anAuthenticatorAttestationResponse
, otherwise, thePublicKeyCredential
was created in response toget()
, and this attribute’s value will be anAuthenticatorAssertionResponse
. getClientExtensionResults()
-
This operation returns the value of
[[clientExtensionsResults]]
, which is a map containing extension identifier → client extension output entries produced by the extension’s client extension processing. [[type]]
-
The
PublicKeyCredential
interface object's[[type]]
internal slot's value is the string "public-key
".Note: This is reflected via the
type
attribute getter inherited fromCredential
. [[discovery]]
-
The
PublicKeyCredential
interface object's[[discovery]]
internal slot's value is "remote
". [[identifier]]
-
This internal slot contains the credential ID, chosen by the authenticator. The credential ID is used to look up credentials for use, and is therefore expected to be globally unique with high probability across all credentials of the same type, across all authenticators.
Note: This API does not constrain the format or length of this identifier, except that it MUST be sufficient for the authenticator to uniquely select a key. For example, an authenticator without on-board storage may create identifiers containing a credential private key wrapped with a symmetric key that is burned into the authenticator.
[[clientExtensionsResults]]
-
This internal slot contains the results of processing client extensions requested by the Relying Party upon the Relying Party's invocation of either
navigator.credentials.create()
ornavigator.credentials.get()
.
PublicKeyCredential
's interface object inherits Credential
's implementation of [[CollectFromCredentialStore]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
, and defines its own
implementation of [[Create]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
, [[DiscoverFromExternalSource]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
, and [[Store]](credential, sameOriginWithAncestors)
.
5.1.1. CredentialCreationOptions
Dictionary Extension
To support registration via navigator.credentials.create()
, this document extends
the CredentialCreationOptions
dictionary as follows:
partial dictionary CredentialCreationOptions {PublicKeyCredentialCreationOptions ; };
publicKey
5.1.2. CredentialRequestOptions
Dictionary Extension
To support obtaining assertions via navigator.credentials.get()
, this document extends the CredentialRequestOptions
dictionary as follows:
partial dictionary CredentialRequestOptions {PublicKeyCredentialRequestOptions ; };
publicKey
5.1.3. Create a New Credential - PublicKeyCredential’s [[Create]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
Method
PublicKeyCredential
's interface object's implementation of the [[Create]](origin,
options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
internal method [CREDENTIAL-MANAGEMENT-1] allows WebAuthn Relying Party scripts to call navigator.credentials.create()
to request the creation of a new public key credential source, bound to an authenticator. This navigator.credentials.create()
operation can be aborted by leveraging the AbortController
;
see DOM §3.3 Using AbortController and AbortSignal objects in APIs for detailed instructions.
This internal method accepts three arguments:
origin
-
This argument is the relevant settings object's origin, as determined by the calling
create()
implementation. options
-
This argument is a
CredentialCreationOptions
object whoseoptions.
member contains apublicKey
PublicKeyCredentialCreationOptions
object specifying the desired attributes of the to-be-created public key credential. sameOriginWithAncestors
-
This argument is a Boolean value which is
true
if and only if the caller’s environment settings object is same-origin with its ancestors. It isfalse
if caller is cross-origin.Note: Invocation of this internal method indicates that it was allowed by feature policy, which is evaluated at the [CREDENTIAL-MANAGEMENT-1] level. See § 5.9 Feature Policy integration.
Note: This algorithm is synchronous: the Promise
resolution/rejection is handled by navigator.credentials.create()
.
Note: All BufferSource
objects used in this algorithm must be snapshotted when the algorithm begins, to
avoid potential synchronization issues. The algorithm implementations should get a copy of the bytes held
by the buffer source and use that copy for relevant portions of the algorithm.
When this method is invoked, the user agent MUST execute the following algorithm:
-
Let options be the value of
options.
.publicKey
-
If the
timeout
member of options is present, check if its value lies within a reasonable range as defined by the client and if not, correct it to the closest value lying within that range. Set a timer lifetimeTimer to this adjusted value. If thetimeout
member of options is not present, then set lifetimeTimer to a client-specific default.Recommended ranges and defaults for the
timeout
member of options are as follows. Ifoptions.
authenticatorSelection
.userVerification
- is set to
discouraged
-
Recommended range: 30000 milliseconds to 180000 milliseconds.
Recommended default value: 120000 milliseconds (2 minutes).
- is set to
required
orpreferred
-
Recommended range: 30000 milliseconds to 600000 milliseconds.
Recommended default value: 300000 milliseconds (5 minutes).
Note: The user agent should take cognitive guidelines into considerations regarding timeout for users with special needs.
- is set to
-
Let callerOrigin be
origin
. If callerOrigin is an opaque origin, return aDOMException
whose name is "NotAllowedError
", and terminate this algorithm. -
Let effectiveDomain be the callerOrigin’s effective domain. If effective domain is not a valid domain, then return a
DOMException
whose name is "SecurityError
" and terminate this algorithm.Note: An effective domain may resolve to a host, which can be represented in various manners, such as domain, ipv4 address, ipv6 address, opaque host, or empty host. Only the domain format of host is allowed here. This is for simplification and also is in recognition of various issues with using direct IP address identification in concert with PKI-based security.
-
- Is present
-
If
options.
is not a registrable domain suffix of and is not equal to effectiveDomain, return arp
.id
DOMException
whose name is "SecurityError
", and terminate this algorithm. - Is not present
Note:
options.
represents the caller’s RP ID. The RP ID defaults to being the caller’s origin's effective domain unless the caller has explicitly setrp
.id
options.
when callingrp
.id
create()
. -
Let credTypesAndPubKeyAlgs be a new list whose items are pairs of
PublicKeyCredentialType
and aCOSEAlgorithmIdentifier
. -
For each current of
options.
:pubKeyCredParams
-
If credTypesAndPubKeyAlgs is empty and
options.
is not empty, return apubKeyCredParams
DOMException
whose name is "NotSupportedError
", and terminate this algorithm. -
Let clientExtensions be a new map and let authenticatorExtensions be a new map.
-
If the
extensions
member of options is present, then for each extensionId → clientExtensionInput ofoptions.
:extensions
-
If extensionId is not supported by this client platform or is not a registration extension, then continue.
-
Set clientExtensions[extensionId] to clientExtensionInput.
-
If extensionId is not an authenticator extension, then continue.
-
Let authenticatorExtensionInput be the (CBOR) result of running extensionId’s client extension processing algorithm on clientExtensionInput. If the algorithm returned an error, continue.
-
Set authenticatorExtensions[extensionId] to the base64url encoding of authenticatorExtensionInput.
-
-
Let collectedClientData be a new
CollectedClientData
instance whose fields are:type
-
The string "webauthn.create".
challenge
-
The base64url encoding of options.
challenge
. origin
-
The serialization of callerOrigin.
crossOrigin
-
The inverse of the value of the
sameOriginWithAncestors
argument passed to this internal method. tokenBinding
-
The status of Token Binding between the client and the callerOrigin, as well as the Token Binding ID associated with callerOrigin, if one is available.
-
Let clientDataJSON be the JSON-serialized client data constructed from collectedClientData.
-
Let clientDataHash be the hash of the serialized client data represented by clientDataJSON.
-
If the
options.
is present and its aborted flag is set tosignal
true
, return aDOMException
whose name is "AbortError
" and terminate this algorithm. -
Let issuedRequests be a new ordered set.
-
Let authenticators represent a value which at any given instant is a set of client platform-specific handles, where each item identifies an authenticator presently available on this client platform at that instant.
Note: What qualifies an authenticator as "available" is intentionally unspecified; this is meant to represent how authenticators can be hot-plugged into (e.g., via USB) or discovered (e.g., via NFC or Bluetooth) by the client by various mechanisms, or permanently built into the client.
-
Start lifetimeTimer.
-
While lifetimeTimer has not expired, perform the following actions depending upon lifetimeTimer, and the state and response for each authenticator in authenticators:
- If lifetimeTimer expires,
-
For each authenticator in issuedRequests invoke the authenticatorCancel operation on authenticator and remove authenticator from issuedRequests.
- If the user exercises a user agent user-interface option to cancel the process,
-
For each authenticator in issuedRequests invoke the authenticatorCancel operation on authenticator and remove authenticator from issuedRequests. Return a
DOMException
whose name is "NotAllowedError
". - If the
options.
is present and its aborted flag is set tosignal
true
, -
For each authenticator in issuedRequests invoke the authenticatorCancel operation on authenticator and remove authenticator from issuedRequests. Then return a
DOMException
whose name is "AbortError
" and terminate this algorithm. - If an authenticator becomes available on this client device,
-
Note: This includes the case where an authenticator was available upon lifetimeTimer initiation.
-
If
options.
is present:authenticatorSelection
-
If
options.
is present and its value is not equal to authenticator’s authenticator attachment modality, continue.authenticatorSelection
.authenticatorAttachment
-
If
options.
authenticatorSelection
.residentKey
- is present and set to
required
-
If the authenticator is not capable of storing a client-side-resident public key credential source, continue.
- is present and set to
preferred
ordiscouraged
-
No effect.
- is not present
-
if
options.
is set toauthenticatorSelection
.requireResidentKey
true
and the authenticator is not capable of storing a client-side-resident public key credential source, continue.
- is present and set to
-
If
options.
is set toauthenticatorSelection
.userVerification
required
and the authenticator is not capable of performing user verification, continue.
-
-
Let requireResidentKey be the effective resident key requirement for credential creation, a Boolean value, as follows:
If
options.
authenticatorSelection
.residentKey
- is present and set to
required
-
Let requireResidentKey be
true
. - is present and set to
preferred
-
If the authenticator
- is capable of client-side credential storage modality
-
Let requireResidentKey be
true
. - is not capable of client-side credential storage modality, or if the client cannot determine authenticator capability,
-
Let requireResidentKey be
false
.
- is present and set to
discouraged
-
Let requireResidentKey be
false
. - is not present
-
Let requireResidentKey be the value of
options.
.authenticatorSelection
.requireResidentKey
- is present and set to
-
Let userVerification be the effective user verification requirement for credential creation, a Boolean value, as follows. If
options.
authenticatorSelection
.userVerification
- is set to
required
-
Let userVerification be
true
. - is set to
preferred
-
If the authenticator
- is capable of user verification
-
Let userVerification be
true
. - is not capable of user verification
-
Let userVerification be
false
.
- is set to
discouraged
-
Let userVerification be
false
.
- is set to
-
Let excludeCredentialDescriptorList be a new list.
-
For each credential descriptor C in
options.
:excludeCredentials
-
If
C.
is not empty, and authenticator is connected over a transport not mentioned intransports
C.
, the client MAY continue.transports
-
Otherwise, Append C to excludeCredentialDescriptorList.
-
-
Invoke the authenticatorMakeCredential operation on authenticator with clientDataHash,
options.
,rp
options.
, requireResidentKey, userVerification, credTypesAndPubKeyAlgs, excludeCredentialDescriptorList, and authenticatorExtensions as parameters.user
-
Append authenticator to issuedRequests.
-
- If an authenticator ceases to be available on this client device,
-
Remove authenticator from issuedRequests.
- If any authenticator returns a status indicating that the user cancelled the operation,
-
-
Remove authenticator from issuedRequests.
-
For each remaining authenticator in issuedRequests invoke the authenticatorCancel operation on authenticator and remove it from issuedRequests.
Note: Authenticators may return an indication of "the user cancelled the entire operation". How a user agent manifests this state to users is unspecified.
-
- If any authenticator returns an error status equivalent to "
InvalidStateError
", -
-
Remove authenticator from issuedRequests.
-
For each remaining authenticator in issuedRequests invoke the authenticatorCancel operation on authenticator and remove it from issuedRequests.
-
Return a
DOMException
whose name is "InvalidStateError
" and terminate this algorithm.
Note: This error status is handled separately because the authenticator returns it only if excludeCredentialDescriptorList identifies a credential bound to the authenticator and the user has consented to the operation. Given this explicit consent, it is acceptable for this case to be distinguishable to the Relying Party.
-
- If any authenticator returns an error status not equivalent to "
InvalidStateError
", -
Remove authenticator from issuedRequests.
Note: This case does not imply user consent for the operation, so details about the error are hidden from the Relying Party in order to prevent leak of potentially identifying information. See § 14.5.1 Registration Ceremony Privacy for details.
- If any authenticator indicates success,
-
-
Remove authenticator from issuedRequests.
-
Let credentialCreationData be a struct whose items are:
attestationObjectResult
-
whose value is the bytes returned from the successful authenticatorMakeCredential operation.
Note: this value is
attObj
, as defined in § 6.5.4 Generating an Attestation Object. clientDataJSONResult
-
whose value is the bytes of clientDataJSON.
attestationConveyancePreferenceOption
-
whose value is the value of options.
attestation
. clientExtensionResults
-
whose value is an
AuthenticationExtensionsClientOutputs
object containing extension identifier → client extension output entries. The entries are created by running each extension’s client extension processing algorithm to create the client extension outputs, for each client extension in
.clientDataJSON
.clientExtensions
-
Let constructCredentialAlg be an algorithm that takes a global object global, and whose steps are:
-
If
credentialCreationData.attestationConveyancePreferenceOption
’s value is- "none"
-
Replace potentially uniquely identifying information with non-identifying versions of the same:
-
If the AAGUID in the attested credential data is 16 zero bytes,
credentialCreationData.attestationObjectResult.fmt
is "packed", and "x5c" & "ecdaaKeyId" are both absent fromcredentialCreationData.attestationObjectResult
, then self attestation is being used and no further action is needed. -
Otherwise
-
Replace the AAGUID in the attested credential data with 16 zero bytes.
-
Set the value of
credentialCreationData.attestationObjectResult.fmt
to "none", and set the value ofcredentialCreationData.attestationObjectResult.attStmt
to be an empty CBOR map. (See § 8.7 None Attestation Statement Format and § 6.5.4 Generating an Attestation Object).
-
-
- "indirect"
-
The client MAY replace the AAGUID and attestation statement with a more privacy-friendly and/or more easily verifiable version of the same data (for example, by employing an Anonymization CA).
- "direct"
-
Convey the authenticator's AAGUID and attestation statement, unaltered, to the Relying Party.
-
Let attestationObject be a new
ArrayBuffer
, created using global’s %ArrayBuffer%, containing the bytes ofcredentialCreationData.attestationObjectResult
’s value. -
Let id be
attestationObject.authData.attestedCredentialData.credentialId
. -
Let pubKeyCred be a new
PublicKeyCredential
object associated with global whose fields are:[[identifier]]
-
id
response
-
A new
AuthenticatorAttestationResponse
object associated with global whose fields are:clientDataJSON
-
A new
ArrayBuffer
, created using global’s %ArrayBuffer%, containing the bytes ofcredentialCreationData.clientDataJSONResult
. attestationObject
-
attestationObject
[[transports]]
-
A sequence of zero or more unique
DOMString
s, in lexicographical order, that the authenticator is believed to support. The values SHOULD be members ofAuthenticatorTransport
.If a user agent does not wish to divulge this information it MAY substitute an arbitrary sequence designed to preserve privacy. This sequence MUST still be valid, i.e. lexicographically sorted and free of duplicates. For example, it may use the empty sequence. Either way, in this case the user agent takes the risk that Relying Party behavior may be suboptimal.
If the user agent does not have any transport information, it SHOULD set this field to the empty sequence.
Note: How user agents discover transports supported by a given authenticator is outside the scope of this specification, but may include information from an attestation certificate (for example [FIDO-Transports-Ext]), metadata communicated in an authenticator protocol such as CTAP2, or special-case knowledge about a platform authenticator.
[[clientExtensionsResults]]
-
A new
ArrayBuffer
, created using global’s %ArrayBuffer%, containing the bytes ofcredentialCreationData.clientExtensionResults
.
-
Return pubKeyCred.
-
-
For each remaining authenticator in issuedRequests invoke the authenticatorCancel operation on authenticator and remove it from issuedRequests.
-
Return constructCredentialAlg and terminate this algorithm.
-
-
Return a
DOMException
whose name is "NotAllowedError
". In order to prevent information leak that could identify the user without consent, this step MUST NOT be executed before lifetimeTimer has expired. See § 14.5.1 Registration Ceremony Privacy for details.
During the above process, the user agent SHOULD show some UI to the user to guide them in the process of selecting and authorizing an authenticator.
5.1.4. Use an Existing Credential to Make an Assertion - PublicKeyCredential’s [[Get]](options)
Method
WebAuthn Relying Parties call navigator.credentials.get({publicKey:..., ...})
to
discover and use an existing public key credential, with the user’s consent. Relying Party script optionally specifies some criteria
to indicate what credential sources are acceptable to it. The client platform locates credential sources matching the specified criteria, and guides the user to pick one that the script will be allowed to use. The user may choose to
decline the entire interaction even if a credential source is present, for example to maintain privacy. If the user picks a credential source, the user agent then uses § 6.3.3 The authenticatorGetAssertion Operation to sign a Relying Party-provided challenge and other collected data into an assertion, which is used as a credential.
The get()
implementation [CREDENTIAL-MANAGEMENT-1] calls PublicKeyCredential.
to collect any credentials that
should be available without user mediation (roughly, this specification’s authorization gesture), and if it does not find
exactly one of those, it then calls [[CollectFromCredentialStore]]()
PublicKeyCredential.
to have
the user select a credential source.[[DiscoverFromExternalSource]]()
Since this specification requires an authorization gesture to create any credentials, the PublicKeyCredential.
internal method inherits the default behavior of [[CollectFromCredentialStore]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
Credential.[[CollectFromCredentialStore]]()
, of returning an empty set.
This navigator.credentials.get()
operation can be aborted by leveraging the AbortController
;
see DOM §3.3 Using AbortController and AbortSignal objects in APIs for detailed instructions.
5.1.4.1. PublicKeyCredential’s [[DiscoverFromExternalSource]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
Method
[[DiscoverFromExternalSource]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
This internal method accepts three arguments:
origin
-
This argument is the relevant settings object's origin, as determined by the calling
get()
implementation, i.e.,CredentialsContainer
's Request aCredential
abstract operation. options
-
This argument is a
CredentialRequestOptions
object whoseoptions.
member contains apublicKey
PublicKeyCredentialRequestOptions
object specifying the desired attributes of the public key credential to discover. sameOriginWithAncestors
-
This argument is a Boolean value which is
true
if and only if the caller’s environment settings object is same-origin with its ancestors. It isfalse
if caller is cross-origin.Note: Invocation of this internal method indicates that it was allowed by feature policy, which is evaluated at the [CREDENTIAL-MANAGEMENT-1] level. See § 5.9 Feature Policy integration.
Note: This algorithm is synchronous: the Promise
resolution/rejection is handled by navigator.credentials.get()
.
Note: All BufferSource
objects used in this algorithm must be snapshotted when the algorithm begins, to
avoid potential synchronization issues. The algorithm implementations should get a copy of the bytes held
by the buffer source and use that copy for relevant portions of the algorithm.
When this method is invoked, the user agent MUST execute the following algorithm:
-
Let options be the value of
options.
.publicKey
-
If the
timeout
member of options is present, check if its value lies within a reasonable range as defined by the client and if not, correct it to the closest value lying within that range. Set a timer lifetimeTimer to this adjusted value. If thetimeout
member of options is not present, then set lifetimeTimer to a client-specific default.Recommended ranges and defaults for the
timeout
member of options are as follows. Ifoptions.
userVerification
- is set to
discouraged
-
Recommended range: 30000 milliseconds to 180000 milliseconds.
Recommended default value: 120000 milliseconds (2 minutes).
- is set to
required
orpreferred
-
Recommended range: 30000 milliseconds to 600000 milliseconds.
Recommended default value: 300000 milliseconds (5 minutes).
Note: The user agent should take cognitive guidelines into considerations regarding timeout for users with special needs.
- is set to
-
Let callerOrigin be
origin
. If callerOrigin is an opaque origin, return aDOMException
whose name is "NotAllowedError
", and terminate this algorithm. -
Let effectiveDomain be the callerOrigin’s effective domain. If effective domain is not a valid domain, then return a
DOMException
whose name is "SecurityError
" and terminate this algorithm.Note: An effective domain may resolve to a host, which can be represented in various manners, such as domain, ipv4 address, ipv6 address, opaque host, or empty host. Only the domain format of host is allowed here. This is for simplification and also is in recognition of various issues with using direct IP address identification in concert with PKI-based security.
-
If options.
rpId
is not present, then set rpId to effectiveDomain.Otherwise:
-
If options.
rpId
is not a registrable domain suffix of and is not equal to effectiveDomain, return aDOMException
whose name is "SecurityError
", and terminate this algorithm. -
Set rpId to options.
rpId
.Note: rpId represents the caller’s RP ID. The RP ID defaults to being the caller’s origin's effective domain unless the caller has explicitly set options.
rpId
when callingget()
.
-
-
Let clientExtensions be a new map and let authenticatorExtensions be a new map.
-
If the
extensions
member of options is present, then for each extensionId → clientExtensionInput ofoptions.
:extensions
-
If extensionId is not supported by this client platform or is not an authentication extension, then continue.
-
Set clientExtensions[extensionId] to clientExtensionInput.
-
If extensionId is not an authenticator extension, then continue.
-
Let authenticatorExtensionInput be the (CBOR) result of running extensionId’s client extension processing algorithm on clientExtensionInput. If the algorithm returned an error, continue.
-
Set authenticatorExtensions[extensionId] to the base64url encoding of authenticatorExtensionInput.
-
-
Let collectedClientData be a new
CollectedClientData
instance whose fields are:type
-
The string "webauthn.get".
challenge
-
The base64url encoding of options.
challenge
origin
-
The serialization of callerOrigin.
crossOrigin
-
The inverse of the value of the
sameOriginWithAncestors
argument passed to this internal method. tokenBinding
-
The status of Token Binding between the client and the callerOrigin, as well as the Token Binding ID associated with callerOrigin, if one is available.
-
Let clientDataJSON be the JSON-serialized client data constructed from collectedClientData.
-
Let clientDataHash be the hash of the serialized client data represented by clientDataJSON.
-
If the
options.
is present and its aborted flag is set tosignal
true
, return aDOMException
whose name is "AbortError
" and terminate this algorithm. -
Let issuedRequests be a new ordered set.
-
Let savedCredentialIds be a new map.
-
Let authenticators represent a value which at any given instant is a set of client platform-specific handles, where each item identifies an authenticator presently available on this client platform at that instant.
Note: What qualifies an authenticator as "available" is intentionally unspecified; this is meant to represent how authenticators can be hot-plugged into (e.g., via USB) or discovered (e.g., via NFC or Bluetooth) by the client by various mechanisms, or permanently built into the client.
-
Start lifetimeTimer.
-
While lifetimeTimer has not expired, perform the following actions depending upon lifetimeTimer, and the state and response for each authenticator in authenticators:
- If lifetimeTimer expires,
-
For each authenticator in issuedRequests invoke the authenticatorCancel operation on authenticator and remove authenticator from issuedRequests.
- If the user exercises a user agent user-interface option to cancel the process,
-
For each authenticator in issuedRequests invoke the authenticatorCancel operation on authenticator and remove authenticator from issuedRequests. Return a
DOMException
whose name is "NotAllowedError
". - If the
signal
member is present and the aborted flag is set totrue
, -
For each authenticator in issuedRequests invoke the authenticatorCancel operation on authenticator and remove authenticator from issuedRequests. Then return a
DOMException
whose name is "AbortError
" and terminate this algorithm. - If issuedRequests is empty,
options.
is not empty, and no authenticator will become available for any public key credentials therein,allowCredentials
-
Indicate to the user that no eligible credential could be found. When the user acknowledges the dialog, return a
DOMException
whose name is "NotAllowedError
".Note: One way a client platform can determine that no authenticator will become available is by examining the
members of the presenttransports
items ofPublicKeyCredentialDescriptor
options.
, if any. For example, if allallowCredentials
items list onlyPublicKeyCredentialDescriptor
, but all platform authenticators have been tried, then there is no possibility of satisfying the request. Alternatively, allinternal
items may listPublicKeyCredentialDescriptor
that the client platform does not support.transports
- If an authenticator becomes available on this client device,
-
Note: This includes the case where an authenticator was available upon lifetimeTimer initiation.
-
If
options.
is set touserVerification
required
and the authenticator is not capable of performing user verification, continue. -
Let userVerification be the effective user verification requirement for assertion, a Boolean value, as follows. If
options.
userVerification
- is set to
required
-
Let userVerification be
true
. - is set to
preferred
-
If the authenticator
- is capable of user verification
-
Let userVerification be
true
. - is not capable of user verification
-
Let userVerification be
false
.
- is set to
discouraged
-
Let userVerification be
false
.
- is set to
-
If
options.
allowCredentials
- is not empty
-
-
Let allowCredentialDescriptorList be a new list.
-
Execute a client platform-specific procedure to determine which, if any, public key credentials described by
options.
are bound to this authenticator, by matching with rpId,allowCredentials
options.
, andallowCredentials
.id
options.
. Set allowCredentialDescriptorList to this filtered list.allowCredentials
.type
-
Let distinctTransports be a new ordered set.
-
If allowCredentialDescriptorList has exactly one value, set
savedCredentialIds[authenticator]
toallowCredentialDescriptorList[0].id
’s value (see here in § 6.3.3 The authenticatorGetAssertion Operation for more information). -
For each credential descriptor C in allowCredentialDescriptorList, append each value, if any, of
C.
to distinctTransports.transports
Note: This will aggregate only distinct values of
transports
(for this authenticator) in distinctTransports due to the properties of ordered sets. -
If distinctTransports
- is not empty
-
The client selects one transport value from distinctTransports, possibly incorporating local configuration knowledge of the appropriate transport to use with authenticator in making its selection.
Then, using transport, invoke the authenticatorGetAssertion operation on authenticator, with rpId, clientDataHash, allowCredentialDescriptorList, userVerification, and authenticatorExtensions as parameters.
- is empty
-
Using local configuration knowledge of the appropriate transport to use with authenticator, invoke the authenticatorGetAssertion operation on authenticator with rpId, clientDataHash, allowCredentialDescriptorList, userVerification, and authenticatorExtensions as parameters.
-
- is empty
-
Using local configuration knowledge of the appropriate transport to use with authenticator, invoke the authenticatorGetAssertion operation on authenticator with rpId, clientDataHash, userVerification and authenticatorExtensions as parameters.
Note: In this case, the Relying Party did not supply a list of acceptable credential descriptors. Thus, the authenticator is being asked to exercise any credential it may possess that is scoped to the Relying Party, as identified by rpId.
-
Append authenticator to issuedRequests.
-
- If an authenticator ceases to be available on this client device,
-
Remove authenticator from issuedRequests.
- If any authenticator returns a status indicating that the user cancelled the operation,
-
-
Remove authenticator from issuedRequests.
-
For each remaining authenticator in issuedRequests invoke the authenticatorCancel operation on authenticator and remove it from issuedRequests.
Note: Authenticators may return an indication of "the user cancelled the entire operation". How a user agent manifests this state to users is unspecified.
-
- If any authenticator returns an error status,
-
Remove authenticator from issuedRequests.
- If any authenticator indicates success,
-
-
Remove authenticator from issuedRequests.
-
Let assertionCreationData be a struct whose items are:
credentialIdResult
-
If
savedCredentialIds[authenticator]
exists, set the value of credentialIdResult to be the bytes ofsavedCredentialIds[authenticator]
. Otherwise, set the value of credentialIdResult to be the bytes of the credential ID returned from the successful authenticatorGetAssertion operation, as defined in § 6.3.3 The authenticatorGetAssertion Operation. clientDataJSONResult
-
whose value is the bytes of clientDataJSON.
authenticatorDataResult
-
whose value is the bytes of the authenticator data returned by the authenticator.
signatureResult
-
whose value is the bytes of the signature value returned by the authenticator.
userHandleResult
-
If the authenticator returned a user handle, set the value of userHandleResult to be the bytes of the returned user handle. Otherwise, set the value of userHandleResult to null.
clientExtensionResults
-
whose value is an
AuthenticationExtensionsClientOutputs
object containing extension identifier → client extension output entries. The entries are created by running each extension’s client extension processing algorithm to create the client extension outputs, for each client extension in
.clientDataJSON
.clientExtensions
-
Let constructAssertionAlg be an algorithm that takes a global object global, and whose steps are:
-
Let pubKeyCred be a new
PublicKeyCredential
object associated with global whose fields are:[[identifier]]
-
A new
ArrayBuffer
, created using global’s %ArrayBuffer%, containing the bytes ofassertionCreationData.credentialIdResult
. response
-
A new
AuthenticatorAssertionResponse
object associated with global whose fields are:clientDataJSON
-
A new
ArrayBuffer
, created using global’s %ArrayBuffer%, containing the bytes ofassertionCreationData.clientDataJSONResult
. authenticatorData
-
A new
ArrayBuffer
, created using global’s %ArrayBuffer%, containing the bytes ofassertionCreationData.authenticatorDataResult
. signature
-
A new
ArrayBuffer
, created using global’s %ArrayBuffer%, containing the bytes ofassertionCreationData.signatureResult
. userHandle
-
If
assertionCreationData.userHandleResult
is null, set this field to null. Otherwise, set this field to a newArrayBuffer
, created using global’s %ArrayBuffer%, containing the bytes ofassertionCreationData.userHandleResult
.
[[clientExtensionsResults]]
-
A new
ArrayBuffer
, created using global’s %ArrayBuffer%, containing the bytes ofassertionCreationData.clientExtensionResults
.
-
Return pubKeyCred.
-
-
For each remaining authenticator in issuedRequests invoke the authenticatorCancel operation on authenticator and remove it from issuedRequests.
-
Return constructAssertionAlg and terminate this algorithm.
-
-
Return a
DOMException
whose name is "NotAllowedError
". In order to prevent information leak that could identify the user without consent, this step MUST NOT be executed before lifetimeTimer has expired. See § 14.5.2 Authentication Ceremony Privacy for details.
During the above process, the user agent SHOULD show some UI to the user to guide them in the process of selecting and authorizing an authenticator with which to complete the operation.
5.1.5. Store an Existing Credential - PublicKeyCredential’s [[Store]](credential, sameOriginWithAncestors)
Method
The [[Store]](credential, sameOriginWithAncestors)
method is not supported
for Web Authentication’s PublicKeyCredential
type, so it always returns an error.
Note: This algorithm is synchronous; the Promise
resolution/rejection is handled by navigator.credentials.store()
.
This internal method accepts two arguments:
credential
-
This argument is a
PublicKeyCredential
object. sameOriginWithAncestors
-
This argument is a Boolean value which is
true
if and only if the caller’s environment settings object is same-origin with its ancestors.
When this method is invoked, the user agent MUST execute the following algorithm:
-
Return a
DOMException
whose name is "NotSupportedError
", and terminate this algorithm
5.1.6. Preventing Silent Access to an Existing Credential - PublicKeyCredential’s [[preventSilentAccess]](credential, sameOriginWithAncestors)
Method
Calling the [[preventSilentAccess]](credential, sameOriginWithAncestors)
method
will have no effect on authenticators that require an authorization gesture,
but setting that flag may potentially exclude authenticators that can operate without user intervention.
This internal method accepts no arguments.
5.1.7. Availability of User-Verifying Platform Authenticator - PublicKeyCredential’s isUserVerifyingPlatformAuthenticatorAvailable()
Method
WebAuthn Relying Parties use this method to determine whether they can create a new credential using a user-verifying platform authenticator.
Upon invocation, the client employs a client platform-specific procedure to discover available user-verifying platform authenticators.
If any are discovered, the promise is resolved with the value of true
.
Otherwise, the promise is resolved with the value of false
.
Based on the result, the Relying Party can take further actions to guide the user to create a credential.
This method has no arguments and returns a Boolean value.
partial interface PublicKeyCredential {static Promise <boolean >(); };
isUserVerifyingPlatformAuthenticatorAvailable
Note: Invoking this method from a browsing context where the Web Authentication API is "disabled" according to the allowed to use algorithm—i.e., by a feature policy—will result in the promise being rejected with a DOMException
whose name is "NotAllowedError
". See also § 5.9 Feature Policy integration.
5.2. Authenticator Responses (interface AuthenticatorResponse
)
Authenticators respond to Relying Party requests by returning an object derived from the AuthenticatorResponse
interface:
[SecureContext ,Exposed =Window ]interface AuthenticatorResponse { [SameObject ]readonly attribute ArrayBuffer clientDataJSON ; };
clientDataJSON
, of type ArrayBuffer, readonly-
This attribute contains a JSON serialization of the client data passed to the authenticator by the client in its call to either
create()
orget()
.
5.2.1. Information About Public Key Credential (interface AuthenticatorAttestationResponse
)
The AuthenticatorAttestationResponse
interface represents the authenticator's response to a client’s request
for the creation of a new public key credential. It contains information about the new credential that can be used to
identify it for later use, and metadata that can be used by the WebAuthn Relying Party to assess the characteristics of the credential
during registration.
[SecureContext ,Exposed =Window ]interface AuthenticatorAttestationResponse :AuthenticatorResponse { [SameObject ]readonly attribute ArrayBuffer attestationObject ;sequence <DOMString >(); };
getTransports
clientDataJSON
-
This attribute, inherited from
AuthenticatorResponse
, contains the JSON-serialized client data (see § 6.5 Attestation) passed to the authenticator by the client in order to generate this credential. The exact JSON serialization MUST be preserved, as the hash of the serialized client data has been computed over it. attestationObject
, of type ArrayBuffer, readonly-
This attribute contains an attestation object, which is opaque to, and cryptographically protected against tampering by, the client. The attestation object contains both authenticator data and an attestation statement. The former contains the AAGUID, a unique credential ID, and the credential public key. The contents of the attestation statement are determined by the attestation statement format used by the authenticator. It also contains any additional information that the Relying Party's server requires to validate the attestation statement, as well as to decode and validate the authenticator data along with the JSON-serialized client data. For more details, see § 6.5 Attestation, § 6.5.4 Generating an Attestation Object, and Figure 6.
getTransports()
-
This operation returns the value of
[[transports]]
. [[transports]]
-
This internal slot contains a sequence of zero or more unique
DOMString
s in lexicographical order. These values are the transports that the authenticator is believed to support, or an empty sequence if the information is unavailable. The values SHOULD be members ofAuthenticatorTransport
but Relying Parties MUST accept unknown values.
5.2.2. Web Authentication Assertion (interface AuthenticatorAssertionResponse
)
The AuthenticatorAssertionResponse
interface represents an authenticator's response to a client’s request for
generation of a new authentication assertion given the WebAuthn Relying Party's challenge and OPTIONAL list of credentials it is
aware of. This response contains a cryptographic signature proving possession of the credential private key, and
optionally evidence of user consent to a specific transaction.
[SecureContext ,Exposed =Window ]interface AuthenticatorAssertionResponse :AuthenticatorResponse { [SameObject ]readonly attribute ArrayBuffer authenticatorData ; [SameObject ]readonly attribute ArrayBuffer signature ; [SameObject ]readonly attribute ArrayBuffer ?userHandle ; };
clientDataJSON
-
This attribute, inherited from
AuthenticatorResponse
, contains the JSON-serialized client data (see § 5.8.1 Client Data Used in WebAuthn Signatures (dictionary CollectedClientData)) passed to the authenticator by the client in order to generate this assertion. The exact JSON serialization MUST be preserved, as the hash of the serialized client data has been computed over it. authenticatorData
, of type ArrayBuffer, readonly-
This attribute contains the authenticator data returned by the authenticator. See § 6.1 Authenticator Data.
signature
, of type ArrayBuffer, readonly-
This attribute contains the raw signature returned from the authenticator. See § 6.3.3 The authenticatorGetAssertion Operation.
userHandle
, of type ArrayBuffer, readonly, nullable-
This attribute contains the user handle returned from the authenticator, or null if the authenticator did not return a user handle. See § 6.3.3 The authenticatorGetAssertion Operation.
5.3. Parameters for Credential Generation (dictionary PublicKeyCredentialParameters
)
dictionary PublicKeyCredentialParameters {required PublicKeyCredentialType type ;required COSEAlgorithmIdentifier alg ; };
type
, of type PublicKeyCredentialType-
This member specifies the type of credential to be created.
alg
, of type COSEAlgorithmIdentifier-
This member specifies the cryptographic signature algorithm with which the newly generated credential will be used, and thus also the type of asymmetric key pair to be generated, e.g., RSA or Elliptic Curve.
Note: we use "alg" as the latter member name, rather than spelling-out "algorithm", because it will be serialized into a message to the authenticator, which may be sent over a low-bandwidth link.
5.4. Options for Credential Creation (dictionary PublicKeyCredentialCreationOptions
)
dictionary PublicKeyCredentialCreationOptions {required PublicKeyCredentialRpEntity rp ;required PublicKeyCredentialUserEntity user ;required BufferSource challenge ;required sequence <PublicKeyCredentialParameters >pubKeyCredParams ;unsigned long timeout ;sequence <PublicKeyCredentialDescriptor >excludeCredentials = [];AuthenticatorSelectionCriteria authenticatorSelection ;AttestationConveyancePreference attestation = "none";AuthenticationExtensionsClientInputs extensions ; };
rp
, of type PublicKeyCredentialRpEntity-
This member contains data about the Relying Party responsible for the request.
Its value’s
name
member is REQUIRED. See § 5.4.1 Public Key Entity Description (dictionary PublicKeyCredentialEntity) for further details.Its value’s
id
member specifies the RP ID the credential should be scoped to. If omitted, its value will be theCredentialsContainer
object’s relevant settings object's origin's effective domain. See § 5.4.2 Relying Party Parameters for Credential Generation (dictionary PublicKeyCredentialRpEntity) for further details. user
, of type PublicKeyCredentialUserEntity-
This member contains data about the user account for which the Relying Party is requesting attestation.
Its value’s
name
,displayName
andid
members are REQUIRED. See § 5.4.1 Public Key Entity Description (dictionary PublicKeyCredentialEntity) and § 5.4.3 User Account Parameters for Credential Generation (dictionary PublicKeyCredentialUserEntity) for further details. challenge
, of type BufferSource-
This member contains a challenge intended to be used for generating the newly created credential’s attestation object. See the § 13.4.1 Cryptographic Challenges security consideration.
pubKeyCredParams
, of type sequence<PublicKeyCredentialParameters>-
This member contains information about the desired properties of the credential to be created. The sequence is ordered from most preferred to least preferred. The client makes a best-effort to create the most preferred credential that it can.
timeout
, of type unsigned long-
This member specifies a time, in milliseconds, that the caller is willing to wait for the call to complete. This is treated as a hint, and MAY be overridden by the client.
excludeCredentials
, of type sequence<PublicKeyCredentialDescriptor>, defaulting toNone
-
This member is intended for use by Relying Parties that wish to limit the creation of multiple credentials for the same account on a single authenticator. The client is requested to return an error if the new credential would be created on an authenticator that also contains one of the credentials enumerated in this parameter.
authenticatorSelection
, of type AuthenticatorSelectionCriteria-
This member is intended for use by Relying Parties that wish to select the appropriate authenticators to participate in the
create()
operation. attestation
, of type AttestationConveyancePreference, defaulting to"none"
-
This member is intended for use by Relying Parties that wish to express their preference for attestation conveyance. The default is
none
. extensions
, of type AuthenticationExtensionsClientInputs-
This member contains additional parameters requesting additional processing by the client and authenticator. For example, the caller may request that only authenticators with certain capabilities be used to create the credential, or that particular information be returned in the attestation object. Some extensions are defined in § 9 WebAuthn Extensions; consult the IANA "WebAuthn Extension Identifier" registry established by [WebAuthn-Registries] for an up-to-date list of registered WebAuthn Extensions.
5.4.1. Public Key Entity Description (dictionary PublicKeyCredentialEntity
)
The PublicKeyCredentialEntity
dictionary describes a user account, or a WebAuthn Relying Party, which a public key credential is
associated with or scoped to, respectively.
dictionary PublicKeyCredentialEntity {required DOMString name ; };
name
, of type DOMString-
A human-palatable name for the entity. Its function depends on what the
PublicKeyCredentialEntity
represents:-
When inherited by
PublicKeyCredentialRpEntity
it is a human-palatable identifier for the Relying Party, intended only for display. For example, "ACME Corporation", "Wonderful Widgets, Inc." or "ОАО Примертех".-
Relying Parties SHOULD perform enforcement, as prescribed in Section 2.3 of [RFC8266] for the Nickname Profile of the PRECIS FreeformClass [RFC8264], when setting
name
's value, or displaying the value to the user. -
Clients SHOULD perform enforcement, as prescribed in Section 2.3 of [RFC8266] for the Nickname Profile of the PRECIS FreeformClass [RFC8264], on
name
's value prior to displaying the value to the user or including the value as a parameter of the authenticatorMakeCredential operation.
-
-
When inherited by
PublicKeyCredentialUserEntity
, it is a human-palatable identifier for a user account. It is intended only for display, i.e., aiding the user in determining the difference between user accounts with similardisplayName
s. For example, "alexm", "alex.p.mueller@example.com" or "+14255551234".-
The Relying Party MAY let the user choose this value. The Relying Party SHOULD perform enforcement, as prescribed in Section 3.4.3 of [RFC8265] for the UsernameCasePreserved Profile of the PRECIS IdentifierClass [RFC8264], when setting
name
's value, or displaying the value to the user. -
Clients SHOULD perform enforcement, as prescribed in Section 3.4.3 of [RFC8265] for the UsernameCasePreserved Profile of the PRECIS IdentifierClass [RFC8264], on
name
's value prior to displaying the value to the user or including the value as a parameter of the authenticatorMakeCredential operation.
-
When clients, client platforms, or authenticators display a
name
's value, they should always use UI elements to provide a clear boundary around the displayed value, and not allow overflow into other elements [css-overflow-3].Authenticators MUST accept and store a 64-byte minimum length for a
name
member’s value. Authenticators MAY truncate aname
member’s value so that it fits within 64 bytes. See § 6.4 String Handling about truncation and other considerations. -
5.4.2. Relying Party Parameters for Credential Generation (dictionary PublicKeyCredentialRpEntity
)
The PublicKeyCredentialRpEntity
dictionary is used to supply additional Relying Party attributes when creating a new credential.
dictionary PublicKeyCredentialRpEntity :PublicKeyCredentialEntity {DOMString id ; };
id
, of type DOMString-
A unique identifier for the Relying Party entity, which sets the RP ID.
5.4.3. User Account Parameters for Credential Generation (dictionary PublicKeyCredentialUserEntity
)
The PublicKeyCredentialUserEntity
dictionary is used to supply additional user account attributes when creating a new
credential.
dictionary PublicKeyCredentialUserEntity :PublicKeyCredentialEntity {required BufferSource id ;required DOMString displayName ; };
id
, of type BufferSource-
The user handle of the user account entity. A user handle is an opaque byte sequence with a maximum size of 64 bytes, and is not meant to be displayed to the user.
To ensure secure operation, authentication and authorization decisions MUST be made on the basis of this
id
member, not thedisplayName
norname
members. See Section 6.1 of [RFC8266].The user handle MUST NOT contain personally identifying information about the user, such as a username or e-mail address; see § 14.6.1 User Handle Contents for details.
displayName
, of type DOMString-
A human-palatable name for the user account, intended only for display. For example, "Alex P. Müller" or "田中 倫". The Relying Party SHOULD let the user choose this, and SHOULD NOT restrict the choice more than necessary.
-
Relying Parties SHOULD perform enforcement, as prescribed in Section 2.3 of [RFC8266] for the Nickname Profile of the PRECIS FreeformClass [RFC8264], when setting
displayName
's value, or displaying the value to the user. -
Clients SHOULD perform enforcement, as prescribed in Section 2.3 of [RFC8266] for the Nickname Profile of the PRECIS FreeformClass [RFC8264], on
displayName
's value prior to displaying the value to the user or including the value as a parameter of the authenticatorMakeCredential operation.
When clients, client platforms, or authenticators display a
displayName
's value, they should always use UI elements to provide a clear boundary around the displayed value, and not allow overflow into other elements [css-overflow-3].Authenticators MUST accept and store a 64-byte minimum length for a
displayName
member’s value. Authenticators MAY truncate adisplayName
member’s value so that it fits within 64 bytes. See § 6.4 String Handling about truncation and other considerations. -
5.4.4. Authenticator Selection Criteria (dictionary AuthenticatorSelectionCriteria
)
WebAuthn Relying Parties may use the AuthenticatorSelectionCriteria
dictionary to specify their requirements regarding authenticator
attributes.
dictionary AuthenticatorSelectionCriteria {AuthenticatorAttachment authenticatorAttachment ;boolean requireResidentKey =false ;ResidentKeyRequirement residentKey ;UserVerificationRequirement userVerification = "preferred"; };
authenticatorAttachment
, of type AuthenticatorAttachment-
If this member is present, eligible authenticators are filtered to only authenticators attached with the specified § 5.4.5 Authenticator Attachment Enumeration (enum AuthenticatorAttachment).
requireResidentKey
, of type boolean, defaulting tofalse
-
Note: This member is retained for backwards compatibility with WebAuthn Level 1 but is deprecated in favour of
residentKey
.requireResidentKey
is ignored if the caller suppliesresidentKey
and the latter is understood by the client. Otherwise,requireResidentKey
's value is used. Note thatrequireResidentKey
's value defaults tofalse
.If used in absence of
residentKey
, it describes the Relying Party's requirements regarding resident credentials. IfrequireResidentKey
is set totrue
, the authenticator MUST create a client-side-resident public key credential source when creating a public key credential. residentKey
, of type ResidentKeyRequirement-
Note: This member supersedes
requireResidentKey
. If both are present and the client understandsresidentKey
, thenresidentKey
is used andrequireResidentKey
is ignored.See
ResidentKeyRequirement
for the description ofresidentKey
's values and semantics. userVerification
, of type UserVerificationRequirement, defaulting to"preferred"
-
This member describes the Relying Party's requirements regarding user verification for the
create()
operation. Eligible authenticators are filtered to only those capable of satisfying this requirement.
5.4.5. Authenticator Attachment Enumeration (enum AuthenticatorAttachment
)
This enumeration’s values describe authenticators' attachment modalities. Relying Parties use this to express a preferred authenticator attachment modality when calling navigator.credentials.create()
to create a credential.
enum AuthenticatorAttachment {"platform" ,"cross-platform" };
platform
-
This value indicates platform attachment.
cross-platform
-
This value indicates cross-platform attachment.
Note: An authenticator attachment modality selection option is available only in the [[Create]](origin, options,
sameOriginWithAncestors)
operation. The Relying Party may use it to, for example, ensure the user has a roaming credential for
authenticating on another client device; or to specifically register a platform credential for easier reauthentication using a
particular client device. The [[DiscoverFromExternalSource]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
operation has no authenticator attachment modality selection option, so the Relying Party SHOULD accept any of the user’s registered credentials. The client and user will then use whichever is available and convenient at the time.
5.4.6. Resident Key Requirement Enumeration (enum ResidentKeyRequirement
)
enum ResidentKeyRequirement {"discouraged" ,"preferred" ,"required" };
This enumeration’s values describe the Relying Party's requirements for resident credentials:
discouraged
-
This value indicates the Relying Party prefers creating a non-resident credential, but will accept a resident credential.
preferred
-
This value indicates the Relying Party prefers creating a resident credential, but will accept a non-resident credential.
required
-
This value indicates the Relying Party requires a resident credential, and is prepared to receive an error if a resident credential cannot be created.
Note: The Relying Party can use a combination of the value provided for options.authenticatorSelection
.residentKey
and the Credential Properties Extension's return value to determine whether or not the authenticator created a resident credential.
This is useful when values of discouraged
or preferred
are used for options.authenticatorSelection
.residentKey
, because in those cases it is possible for an authenticator to create either a resident credential or a non-resident credential.
5.4.7. Attestation Conveyance Preference Enumeration (enum AttestationConveyancePreference
)
WebAuthn Relying Parties may use AttestationConveyancePreference
to specify their preference regarding attestation conveyance during credential generation.
enum AttestationConveyancePreference {"none" ,"indirect" ,"direct" };
none
-
This value indicates that the Relying Party is not interested in authenticator attestation. For example, in order to potentially avoid having to obtain user consent to relay identifying information to the Relying Party, or to save a roundtrip to an Attestation CA.
This is the default value.
indirect
-
This value indicates that the Relying Party prefers an attestation conveyance yielding verifiable attestation statements, but allows the client to decide how to obtain such attestation statements. The client MAY replace the authenticator-generated attestation statements with attestation statements generated by an Anonymization CA, in order to protect the user’s privacy, or to assist Relying Parties with attestation verification in a heterogeneous ecosystem.
Note: There is no guarantee that the Relying Party will obtain a verifiable attestation statement in this case. For example, in the case that the authenticator employs self attestation.
direct
-
This value indicates that the Relying Party wants to receive the attestation statement as generated by the authenticator.
5.5. Options for Assertion Generation (dictionary PublicKeyCredentialRequestOptions
)
The PublicKeyCredentialRequestOptions
dictionary supplies get()
with the data it needs to generate
an assertion. Its challenge
member MUST be present, while its other members are OPTIONAL.
dictionary PublicKeyCredentialRequestOptions {required BufferSource challenge ;unsigned long timeout ;USVString rpId ;sequence <PublicKeyCredentialDescriptor >allowCredentials = [];UserVerificationRequirement userVerification = "preferred";AuthenticationExtensionsClientInputs extensions ; };
challenge
, of type BufferSource-
This member represents a challenge that the selected authenticator signs, along with other data, when producing an authentication assertion. See the § 13.4.1 Cryptographic Challenges security consideration.
timeout
, of type unsigned long-
This OPTIONAL member specifies a time, in milliseconds, that the caller is willing to wait for the call to complete. The value is treated as a hint, and MAY be overridden by the client.
rpId
, of type USVString-
This OPTIONAL member specifies the relying party identifier claimed by the caller. If omitted, its value will be the
CredentialsContainer
object’s relevant settings object's origin's effective domain. allowCredentials
, of type sequence<PublicKeyCredentialDescriptor>, defaulting toNone
-
This OPTIONAL member contains a list of
PublicKeyCredentialDescriptor
objects representing public key credentials acceptable to the caller, in descending order of the caller’s preference (the first item in the list is the most preferred credential, and so on down the list). userVerification
, of type UserVerificationRequirement, defaulting to"preferred"
-
This OPTIONAL member describes the Relying Party's requirements regarding user verification for the
get()
operation. Eligible authenticators are filtered to only those capable of satisfying this requirement. extensions
, of type AuthenticationExtensionsClientInputs-
This OPTIONAL member contains additional parameters requesting additional processing by the client and authenticator. For example, if transaction confirmation is sought from the user, then the prompt string might be included as an extension.
5.6. Abort Operations with AbortSignal
Developers are encouraged to leverage the AbortController
to manage the [[Create]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
and [[DiscoverFromExternalSource]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
operations.
See DOM §3.3 Using AbortController and AbortSignal objects in APIs section for detailed instructions.
Note: DOM §3.3 Using AbortController and AbortSignal objects in APIs section specifies that web platform APIs integrating with the AbortController
must reject the promise immediately once the aborted flag is set.
Given the complex inheritance and parallelization structure of the [[Create]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
and [[DiscoverFromExternalSource]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
methods, the algorithms for the two APIs fulfills this
requirement by checking the aborted flag in three places. In the case of [[Create]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
, the aborted flag is checked first in Credential Management 1 §2.5.4 Create a Credential immediately before calling [[Create]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
,
then in § 5.1.3 Create a New Credential - PublicKeyCredential’s [[Create]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors) Method right before authenticator sessions start, and finally
during authenticator sessions. The same goes for [[DiscoverFromExternalSource]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
.
The visibility and focus state of the Window object determines whether the [[Create]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
and [[DiscoverFromExternalSource]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
operations
should continue. When the Window object associated with the [Document loses focus, [[Create]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
and [[DiscoverFromExternalSource]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
operations
SHOULD be aborted.
The WHATWG HTML WG is discussing whether to provide a hook when a browsing context gains or loses focuses. If a hook is provided, the above paragraph will be updated to include the hook. See WHATWG HTML WG Issue #2711 for more details.
5.7. WebAuthn Extensions Inputs and Outputs
The subsections below define the data types used for conveying WebAuthn extension inputs and outputs.
Note: Authenticator extension outputs are conveyed as a part of Authenticator data (see Table 1).
Note: The types defined below—AuthenticationExtensionsClientInputs
, AuthenticationExtensionsClientOutputs
, and AuthenticationExtensionsAuthenticatorInputs
—are applicable to both registration extensions and authentication extensions. The "Authentication..." portion of their names should be regarded as meaning "WebAuthentication..."
5.7.1. Authentication Extensions Client Inputs (dictionary AuthenticationExtensionsClientInputs
) ## {#iface-authentication-extensions-client-inputs}
dictionary { };
AuthenticationExtensionsClientInputs
This is a dictionary containing the client extension input values for zero or more WebAuthn Extensions.
5.7.2. Authentication Extensions Client Outputs (dictionary AuthenticationExtensionsClientOutputs
) ## {#iface-authentication-extensions-client-outputs}
dictionary { };
AuthenticationExtensionsClientOutputs
This is a dictionary containing the client extension output values for zero or more WebAuthn Extensions.
5.7.3. Authentication Extensions Authenticator Inputs (typedef AuthenticationExtensionsAuthenticatorInputs
) ## {#iface-authentication-extensions-authenticator-inputs}
typedef record <DOMString ,DOMString >;
AuthenticationExtensionsAuthenticatorInputs
This is a dictionary containing the authenticator extension input values for zero or more WebAuthn Extensions.
5.8. Supporting Data Structures
The public key credential type uses certain data structures that are specified in supporting specifications. These are as follows.
5.8.1. Client Data Used in WebAuthn Signatures (dictionary CollectedClientData
)
The client data represents the contextual bindings of both the WebAuthn Relying Party and the client. It is a key-value mapping whose keys are strings. Values can be any type that has a valid encoding in JSON. Its structure is defined by the following Web IDL.
Note: The CollectedClientData
may be extended in the future. Therefore it’s critical when parsing to be tolerant of unknown keys and of any reordering of the keys.
dictionary CollectedClientData {required DOMString type ;required DOMString challenge ;required DOMString origin ;boolean crossOrigin ;TokenBinding tokenBinding ; };dictionary {
TokenBinding required TokenBindingStatus status ;DOMString id ; };enum {
TokenBindingStatus "present" ,"supported" };
type
, of type DOMString-
This member contains the string "webauthn.create" when creating new credentials, and "webauthn.get" when getting an assertion from an existing credential. The purpose of this member is to prevent certain types of signature confusion attacks (where an attacker substitutes one legitimate signature for another).
challenge
, of type DOMString-
This member contains the base64url encoding of the challenge provided by the Relying Party. See the § 13.4.1 Cryptographic Challenges security consideration.
origin
, of type DOMString-
This member contains the fully qualified origin of the requester, as provided to the authenticator by the client, in the syntax defined by [RFC6454].
crossOrigin
, of type boolean-
This member contains the inverse of the
sameOriginWithAncestors
argument value that was passed into the internal method. tokenBinding
, of type TokenBinding-
This OPTIONAL member contains information about the state of the Token Binding protocol [TokenBinding] used when communicating with the Relying Party. Its absence indicates that the client doesn’t support token binding.
status
, of type TokenBindingStatus-
This member is one of the following:
supported
-
Indicates the client supports token binding, but it was not negotiated when communicating with the Relying Party.
present
-
Indicates token binding was used when communicating with the Relying Party. In this case, the
id
member MUST be present.
id
, of type DOMString-
This member MUST be present if
status
ispresent
, and MUST be a base64url encoding of the Token Binding ID that was used when communicating with the Relying Party.
Note: Obtaining a Token Binding ID is a client platform-specific operation.
The CollectedClientData
structure is used by the client to compute the following quantities:
- JSON-serialized client data
-
This is the result of JSON-serializing to bytes a
CollectedClientData
dictionary. - Hash of the serialized client data
-
This is the hash (computed using SHA-256) of the JSON-serialized client data, as constructed by the client.
5.8.2. Credential Type Enumeration (enum PublicKeyCredentialType
)
enum PublicKeyCredentialType {"public-key" };
Currently one credential type is defined, namely "public-key
".
5.8.3. Credential Descriptor (dictionary PublicKeyCredentialDescriptor
)
dictionary PublicKeyCredentialDescriptor {required PublicKeyCredentialType type ;required BufferSource id ;sequence <DOMString >transports ; };
This dictionary contains the attributes that are specified by a caller when referring to a public key credential as an input
parameter to the create()
or get()
methods. It mirrors the fields of the PublicKeyCredential
object returned by the latter methods.
type
, of type PublicKeyCredentialType-
This member contains the type of the public key credential the caller is referring to.
id
, of type BufferSource-
This member contains the credential ID of the public key credential the caller is referring to.
transports
, of type sequence<DOMString>-
This OPTIONAL member contains a hint as to how the client might communicate with the managing authenticator of the public key credential the caller is referring to. The values SHOULD be members of
AuthenticatorTransport
but client platforms MUST ignore unknown values. ThegetTransports()
operation can provide suitable values for this member.
5.8.4. Authenticator Transport Enumeration (enum AuthenticatorTransport
)
enum AuthenticatorTransport {"usb" ,"nfc" ,"ble" ,"internal" ,"lightning" };
getTransports()
.
Note: The AuthenticatorTransport
enumeration is not referenced by other parts of the Web IDL because that would preclude other values from being used without updating this specification and its implementations. It is important for backwards compatibility that client platforms and Relying Parties handle unknown values. Therefore it exists here for documentation and as a registry. Where transports are represented elsewhere, they are typed as DOMString
s, for example in transports
.
usb
-
Indicates the respective authenticator can be contacted over removable USB.
lightning
-
Indicates the respective authenticator can be contacted over removable Lightning.
nfc
-
Indicates the respective authenticator can be contacted over Near Field Communication (NFC).
ble
-
Indicates the respective authenticator can be contacted over Bluetooth Smart (Bluetooth Low Energy / BLE).
internal
-
Indicates the respective authenticator is contacted using a client device-specific transport, i.e., it is a platform authenticator. These authenticators are not removable from the client device.
5.8.5. Cryptographic Algorithm Identifier (typedef COSEAlgorithmIdentifier
)
typedef long ;
COSEAlgorithmIdentifier
COSEAlgorithmIdentifier
's value is a number identifying a cryptographic algorithm.
The algorithm identifiers SHOULD be values registered in the IANA COSE Algorithms registry [IANA-COSE-ALGS-REG],
for instance, -7
for "ES256" and -257
for "RS256". 5.8.6. User Verification Requirement Enumeration (enum UserVerificationRequirement
)
enum UserVerificationRequirement {"required" ,"preferred" ,"discouraged" };
A WebAuthn Relying Party may require user verification for some of its operations but not for others, and may use this type to express its needs.
required
-
This value indicates that the Relying Party requires user verification for the operation and will fail the operation if the response does not have the UV flag set.
preferred
-
This value indicates that the Relying Party prefers user verification for the operation if possible, but will not fail the operation if the response does not have the UV flag set.
discouraged
-
This value indicates that the Relying Party does not want user verification employed during the operation (e.g., in the interest of minimizing disruption to the user interaction flow).
5.9. Feature Policy integration
This specification defines a policy-controlled feature identified by
the feature-identifier token "publickey-credentials
".
Its default allowlist is 'self
'. [Feature-Policy]
A Document
's feature policy determines whether any content in that document is allowed to successfully invoke the Web Authentication API, i.e., via navigator.credentials.create({publicKey:..., ...})
and navigator.credentials.get({publicKey:..., ...})
.
If disabled in any document, no content in the document will be allowed to use the foregoing methods: attempting to do so will return an error.
Note: Algorithms specified in [CREDENTIAL-MANAGEMENT-1] perform the actual feature policy evaluation. This is because such policy evaluation needs to occur when there is access to the current settings object. The [[Create]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
and [[DiscoverFromExternalSource]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
internal methods do not have such access since they are invoked in parallel (by algorithms specified in [CREDENTIAL-MANAGEMENT-1]).
5.10. Using Web Authentication within iframe
elements
The Web Authentication API is disabled by default in cross-origin iframe
s.
To override this default policy and indicate that a cross-origin iframe
is allowed to invoke the Web Authentication API, specify the allow
attribute on the iframe
element and include the publickey-credentials
feature-identifier token in the allow
attribute’s value.
6. WebAuthn Authenticator Model
The Web Authentication API implies a specific abstract functional model for a WebAuthn Authenticator. This section describes that authenticator model.
Client platforms MAY implement and expose this abstract model in any way desired. However, the behavior of the client’s Web Authentication API implementation, when operating on the authenticators supported by that client platform, MUST be indistinguishable from the behavior specified in § 5 Web Authentication API.
Note: [FIDO-CTAP] is an example of a concrete instantiation of this model, but it is one in which there are differences in the data it returns and those expected by the WebAuthn API's algorithms. The CTAP2 response messages are CBOR maps constructed using integer keys rather than the string keys defined in this specification for the same objects. The client is expected to perform any needed transformations on such data. The [FIDO-CTAP] specification details the mapping between CTAP2 integer keys and WebAuthn string keys, in section §6.2. Responses.
For authenticators, this model defines the logical operations that they MUST support, and the data formats that they expose to the client and the WebAuthn Relying Party. However, it does not define the details of how authenticators communicate with the client device, unless they are necessary for interoperability with Relying Parties. For instance, this abstract model does not define protocols for connecting authenticators to clients over transports such as USB or NFC. Similarly, this abstract model does not define specific error codes or methods of returning them; however, it does define error behavior in terms of the needs of the client. Therefore, specific error codes are mentioned as a means of showing which error conditions MUST be distinguishable (or not) from each other in order to enable a compliant and secure client implementation.
Relying Parties may influence authenticator selection, if they deem necessary, by stipulating various authenticator characteristics when creating credentials and/or when generating assertions, through use of credential creation options or assertion generation options, respectively. The algorithms underlying the WebAuthn API marshal these options and pass them to the applicable authenticator operations defined below.
In this abstract model, the authenticator provides key management and cryptographic signatures. It can be embedded in the WebAuthn client or housed in a separate device entirely. The authenticator itself can contain a cryptographic module which operates at a higher security level than the rest of the authenticator. This is particularly important for authenticators that are embedded in the WebAuthn client, as in those cases this cryptographic module (which may, for example, be a TPM) could be considered more trustworthy than the rest of the authenticator.
Each authenticator stores a credentials map, a map from (rpId, [userHandle]) to public key credential source.
Additionally, each authenticator has an AAGUID, which is a 128-bit identifier indicating the type (e.g. make and model) of the authenticator. The AAGUID MUST be chosen by the manufacturer to be identical across all substantially identical authenticators made by that manufacturer, and different (with high probability) from the AAGUIDs of all other types of authenticators. The AAGUID for a given type of authenticator SHOULD be randomly generated to ensure this. The Relying Party MAY use the AAGUID to infer certain properties of the authenticator, such as certification level and strength of key protection, using information from other sources.
The primary function of the authenticator is to provide WebAuthn signatures, which are bound to various contextual data. These data are observed and added at different levels of the stack as a signature request passes from the server to the authenticator. In verifying a signature, the server checks these bindings against expected values. These contextual bindings are divided in two: Those added by the Relying Party or the client, referred to as client data; and those added by the authenticator, referred to as the authenticator data. The authenticator signs over the client data, but is otherwise not interested in its contents. To save bandwidth and processing requirements on the authenticator, the client hashes the client data and sends only the result to the authenticator. The authenticator signs over the combination of the hash of the serialized client data, and its own authenticator data.
The goals of this design can be summarized as follows.
-
The scheme for generating signatures should accommodate cases where the link between the client device and authenticator is very limited, in bandwidth and/or latency. Examples include Bluetooth Low Energy and Near-Field Communication.
-
The data processed by the authenticator should be small and easy to interpret in low-level code. In particular, authenticators should not have to parse high-level encodings such as JSON.
-
Both the client and the authenticator should have the flexibility to add contextual bindings as needed.
-
The design aims to reuse as much as possible of existing encoding formats in order to aid adoption and implementation.
Authenticators produce cryptographic signatures for two distinct purposes:
-
An attestation signature is produced when a new public key credential is created via an authenticatorMakeCredential operation. An attestation signature provides cryptographic proof of certain properties of the authenticator and the credential. For instance, an attestation signature asserts the authenticator type (as denoted by its AAGUID) and the credential public key. The attestation signature is signed by an attestation private key, which is chosen depending on the type of attestation desired. For more details on attestation, see § 6.5 Attestation.
-
An assertion signature is produced when the authenticatorGetAssertion method is invoked. It represents an assertion by the authenticator that the user has consented to a specific transaction, such as logging in, or completing a purchase. Thus, an assertion signature asserts that the authenticator possessing a particular credential private key has established, to the best of its ability, that the user requesting this transaction is the same user who consented to creating that particular public key credential. It also asserts additional information, termed client data, that may be useful to the caller, such as the means by which user consent was provided, and the prompt shown to the user by the authenticator. The assertion signature format is illustrated in Figure 4, below.
The term WebAuthn signature refers to both attestation signatures and assertion signatures. The formats of these signatures, as well as the procedures for generating them, are specified below.
6.1. Authenticator Data
The authenticator data structure encodes contextual bindings made by the authenticator. These bindings are controlled by the authenticator itself, and derive their trust from the WebAuthn Relying Party's assessment of the security properties of the authenticator. In one extreme case, the authenticator may be embedded in the client, and its bindings may be no more trustworthy than the client data. At the other extreme, the authenticator may be a discrete entity with high-security hardware and software, connected to the client over a secure channel. In both cases, the Relying Party receives the authenticator data in the same format, and uses its knowledge of the authenticator to make trust decisions.
The authenticator data has a compact but extensible encoding. This is desired since authenticators can be devices with limited capabilities and low power requirements, with much simpler software stacks than the client platform.
The authenticator data structure is a byte array of 37 bytes or more, laid out as shown in Table .
Name | Length (in bytes) | Description |
---|---|---|
rpIdHash | 32 | SHA-256 hash of the RP ID the credential is scoped to. |
flags | 1 |
Flags (bit 0 is the least significant bit):
|
signCount | 4 | Signature counter, 32-bit unsigned big-endian integer. |
attestedCredentialData | variable (if present) | attested credential data (if present). See § 6.5.1 Attested Credential Data for details. Its length depends on the length of the credential ID and credential public key being attested. |
extensions | variable (if present) | Extension-defined authenticator data. This is a CBOR [RFC7049] map with extension identifiers as keys, and authenticator extension outputs as values. See § 9 WebAuthn Extensions for details. |
The RP ID is originally received from the client when the credential is created, and again when an assertion is generated. However, it differs from other client data in some important ways. First, unlike the client data, the RP ID of a credential does not change between operations but instead remains the same for the lifetime of that credential. Secondly, it is validated by the authenticator during the authenticatorGetAssertion operation, by verifying that the RP ID that the requested credential is scoped to exactly matches the RP ID supplied by the client.
Authenticators perform the following steps to generate an authenticator data structure:
-
The
UP
flag SHALL be set if and only if the authenticator performed a test of user presence. TheUV
flag SHALL be set if and only if the authenticator performed user verification. TheRFU
bits SHALL be set to zero.Note: If the authenticator performed both a test of user presence and user verification, possibly combined in a single authorization gesture, then the authenticator will set both the
UP
flag and theUV
flag. -
For attestation signatures, the authenticator MUST set the AT flag and include the
attestedCredentialData
. For assertion signatures, the AT flag MUST NOT be set and theattestedCredentialData
MUST NOT be included. -
If the authenticator does not include any extension data, it MUST set the
ED
flag to zero, and to one if extension data is included.
Figure shows a visual representation of the authenticator data structure.
Determining attested credential data's length, which is variable, involves determining credentialPublicKey
’s beginning location given the preceding credentialId
’s length, and then determining the credentialPublicKey
’s length (see also Section 7 of [RFC8152]).
6.1.1. Signature Counter Considerations
Authenticators SHOULD implement a signature counter feature. The signature counter is incremented for each successful authenticatorGetAssertion operation by some positive value, and its value is returned to the WebAuthn Relying Party within the authenticator data. The signature counter's purpose is to aid Relying Parties in detecting cloned authenticators. Clone detection is more important for authenticators with limited protection measures.
A Relying Party stores the signature counter of the most recent authenticatorGetAssertion operation. Upon a new authenticatorGetAssertion operation, the Relying Party compares the stored signature counter value with the new signCount
value returned in the assertion’s authenticator data. If this new signCount
value is less than or equal to the stored value, a cloned authenticator may exist, or the authenticator may be malfunctioning.
Detecting a signature counter mismatch does not indicate whether the current operation was performed by a cloned authenticator or the original authenticator. Relying Parties should address this situation appropriately relative to their individual situations, i.e., their risk tolerance.
Authenticators:
-
SHOULD implement per credential signature counters. This prevents the signature counter value from being shared between Relying Parties and being possibly employed as a correlation handle for the user. Authenticators may implement a global signature counter, i.e., on a per-authenticator basis, but this is less privacy-friendly for users.
-
SHOULD ensure that the signature counter value does not accidentally decrease (e.g., due to hardware failures).
6.1.2. FIDO U2F Signature Format Compatibility
The format for assertion signatures, which sign over the concatenation of an authenticator data structure and the hash of the serialized client data, are compatible with the FIDO U2F authentication signature format (see Section 5.4 of [FIDO-U2F-Message-Formats]).
This is because the first 37 bytes of the signed data in a FIDO U2F authentication response message constitute a valid authenticator data structure, and the remaining 32 bytes are the hash of the serialized client data. In this authenticator data structure, the rpIdHash
is the FIDO U2F application parameter, all flags
except UP
are always zero, and the attestedCredentialData
and extensions
are never present. FIDO U2F authentication signatures can therefore be verified by
the same procedure as other assertion signatures generated by the authenticatorMakeCredential operation.
6.2. Authenticator Taxonomy
Many use cases are dependent on the capabilities of the authenticator used. This section defines some terminology for those capabilities, their most important combinations, and which use cases those combinations enable.
For example:
-
When authenticating for the first time on a particular client device, a roaming authenticator is typically needed since the user doesn’t yet have a platform credential on that client device.
-
For subsequent re-authentication on the same client device, a platform authenticator is likely the most convenient since it’s built directly into the client device rather than being a separate device that the user may have to locate.
-
For second-factor authentication in addition to a traditional username and password, any authenticator can be used.
-
Passwordless multi-factor authentication requires an authenticator capable of user verification, and in some cases also resident credential capable.
-
A laptop computer might support connecting to roaming authenticators via USB and Bluetooth, while a mobile phone might only support NFC.
The above examples illustrate the the primary authenticator type characteristics:
-
Whether the authenticator is a roaming or platform authenticator — the authenticator attachment modality. A roaming authenticator can support one or more transports for communicating with the client.
-
Whether the authenticator is capable of user verification — the authentication factor capability.
-
Whether the authenticator is resident credential capable — the credential storage modality.
These characteristics are independent and may in theory be combined in any way, but Table lists and names some authenticator types of particular interest.
Authenticator Type | Authenticator Attachment Modality | Credential Storage Modality | Authentication Factor Capability |
---|---|---|---|
Second-factor platform authenticator | platform | Either | Single-factor capable |
User-verifying platform authenticator | platform | Either | Multi-factor capable |
Second-factor roaming authenticator | cross-platform | Server-side storage | Single-factor capable |
First-factor roaming authenticator | cross-platform | Client-side storage | Multi-factor capable |
A second-factor platform authenticator is convenient to use for re-authentication on the same client device, and can be used to add an extra layer of security both when initiating a new session and when resuming an existing session. A second-factor roaming authenticator is more likely to be used to authenticate on a particular client device for the first time, or on a client device shared between multiple users.
User-verifying platform authenticators and first-factor roaming authenticators enable passwordless multi-factor authentication. In addition to the proof of possession of the credential private key, these authenticators support user verification as a second authentication factor, typically a PIN or biometric recognition. The authenticator can thus act as two kinds of authentication factor, which enables multi-factor authentication while eliminating the need to share a password with the Relying Party.
The four combinations not named in Table have less distinguished use cases:
-
The credential storage modality is less relevant for a platform authenticator than for a roaming authenticator, since users using a platform authenticator can typically be identified by a session cookie or the like (i.e., ambient credentials).
-
A roaming authenticator that is resident credential capable but not multi-factor capable can be used for single-factor authentication without a username, where the user is automatically identified by the user handle and possession of the credential private key is used as the only authentication factor. This can be useful in some situations, but makes the user particularly vulnerable to theft of the authenticator.
-
A roaming authenticator that is multi-factor capable but not resident credential capable can be used for multi-factor authentication, but requires the user to be identified first which risks leaking personally identifying information; see § 14.6.3 Privacy leak via credential IDs.
The following subsections define the aspects authenticator attachment modality, credential storage modality and authentication factor capability in more depth.
6.2.1. Authenticator Attachment Modality
Clients can communicate with authenticators using a variety of mechanisms. For example, a client MAY use a client device-specific API to communicate with an authenticator which is physically bound to a client device. On the other hand, a client can use a variety of standardized cross-platform transport protocols such as Bluetooth (see § 5.8.4 Authenticator Transport Enumeration (enum AuthenticatorTransport)) to discover and communicate with cross-platform attached authenticators. We refer to authenticators that are part of the client device as platform authenticators, while those that are reachable via cross-platform transport protocols are referred to as roaming authenticators.
-
A platform authenticator is attached using a client device-specific transport, called platform attachment, and is usually not removable from the client device. A public key credential bound to a platform authenticator is called a platform credential.
-
A roaming authenticator is attached using cross-platform transports, called cross-platform attachment. Authenticators of this class are removable from, and can "roam" between, client devices. A public key credential bound to a roaming authenticator is called a roaming credential.
Some platform authenticators could possibly also act as roaming authenticators depending on context. For example, a platform authenticator integrated into a mobile device could make itself available as a roaming authenticator via Bluetooth. In this case clients running on the mobile device would recognise the authenticator as a platform authenticator, while clients running on a different client device and communicating with the same authenticator via Bluetooth would recognize it as a roaming authenticator.
The primary use case for platform authenticators is to register a particular client device as a "trusted device", so the client device itself acts as a something you have authentication factor for future authentication. This gives the user the convenience benefit of not needing a roaming authenticator for future authentication ceremonies, e.g., the user will not have to dig around in their pocket for their key fob or phone.
Use cases for roaming authenticators include: authenticating on a new client device for the first time, on rarely used client devices, client devices shared between multiple users, or client devices that do not include a platform authenticator; and when policy or preference dictates that the authenticator be kept separate from the client devices it is used with. A roaming authenticator can also be used to hold backup credentials in case another authenticator is lost.
6.2.2. Credential Storage Modality
An authenticator can store a public key credential source in one of two ways:
-
In persistent storage embedded in the authenticator, client or client device, e.g., in a secure element. This is a technical requirement for a client-side-resident public key credential source.
-
By encrypting (i.e., wrapping) the credential private key such that only this authenticator can decrypt (i.e., unwrap) it and letting the resulting ciphertext be the credential ID for the public key credential source. The credential ID is stored by the Relying Party and returned to the authenticator via the
allowCredentials
option ofget()
, which allows the authenticator to decrypt and use the credential private key.This enables the authenticator to have unlimited storage capacity for credential private keys, since the encrypted credential private keys are stored by the Relying Party instead of by the authenticator - but it means that a credential stored in this way must be retrieved from the Relying Party before the authenticator can use it.
Which of these storage strategies an authenticator supports defines the authenticator's credential storage modality as follows:
-
An authenticator has the client-side credential storage modality if it supports client-side-resident public key credential sources. An authenticator with client-side credential storage modality is also called resident credential capable.
-
An authenticator has the server-side credential storage modality if it does not have the client-side credential storage modality, i.e., it only supports storing credential private keys as a ciphertext in the credential ID.
Note that a resident credential capable authenticator MAY support both storage strategies. In this case, the authenticator MAY
at its discretion use different storage strategies for different credentials, though subject to the residentKey
or requireResidentKey
options of create()
.
6.2.3. Authentication Factor Capability
There are three broad classes of authentication factors that can be used to prove an identity during an authentication ceremony: something you have, something you know and something you are. Examples include a physical key, a password, and a fingerprint, respectively.
All WebAuthn Authenticators belong to the something you have class, but an authenticator that supports user verification can also act as one or two additional kinds of authentication factor. For example, if the authenticator can verify a PIN, the PIN is something you know, and a biometric authenticator can verify something you are. Therefore, an authenticator that supports user verification is multi-factor capable. Conversely, an authenticator that is not multi-factor capable is single-factor capable. Note that a single multi-factor capable authenticator could support several modes of user verification, meaning it could act as all three kinds of authentication factor.
Although user verification is performed locally on the authenticator and not by the Relying Party, the authenticator indicates if user verification was performed by setting the UV flag in the signed response returned to the Relying Party. The Relying Party can therefore use the UV flag to verify that additional authentication factors were used in a registration or authentication ceremony. The authenticity of the UV flag can in turn be assessed by inspecting the authenticator's attestation statement.
6.3. Authenticator Operations
A WebAuthn Client MUST connect to an authenticator in order to invoke any of the operations of that authenticator. This connection defines an authenticator session. An authenticator must maintain isolation between sessions. It may do this by only allowing one session to exist at any particular time, or by providing more complicated session management.
The following operations can be invoked by the client in an authenticator session.
6.3.1. Lookup Credential Source by Credential ID Algorithm
The result of looking up a credential id credentialId in an authenticator authenticator is the result of the following algorithm:
-
If authenticator can decrypt credentialId into a public key credential source credSource:
-
Set credSource.id to credentialId.
-
Return credSource.
-
-
For each public key credential source credSource of authenticator’s credentials map:
-
If credSource.id is credentialId, return credSource.
-
-
Return
null
.
6.3.2. The authenticatorMakeCredential Operation
It takes the following input parameters:
- hash
-
The hash of the serialized client data, provided by the client.
- rpEntity
- userEntity
-
The user account’s
PublicKeyCredentialUserEntity
, containing the user handle given by the Relying Party. - requireResidentKey
-
The effective resident key requirement for credential creation, a Boolean value determined by the client.
- requireUserPresence
-
The constant Boolean value
true
. It is included here as a pseudo-parameter to simplify applying this abstract authenticator model to implementations that may wish to make a test of user presence optional although WebAuthn does not. - requireUserVerification
-
The effective user verification requirement for credential creation, a Boolean value determined by the client.
- credTypesAndPubKeyAlgs
-
A sequence of pairs of
PublicKeyCredentialType
and public key algorithms (COSEAlgorithmIdentifier
) requested by the Relying Party. This sequence is ordered from most preferred to least preferred. The authenticator makes a best-effort to create the most preferred credential that it can. - excludeCredentialDescriptorList
-
An OPTIONAL list of
PublicKeyCredentialDescriptor
objects provided by the Relying Party with the intention that, if any of these are known to the authenticator, it SHOULD NOT create a new credential. excludeCredentialDescriptorList contains a list of known credentials. - extensions
-
A CBOR map from extension identifiers to their authenticator extension inputs, created by the client based on the extensions requested by the Relying Party, if any.
Note: Before performing this operation, all other operations in progress in the authenticator session MUST be aborted by running the authenticatorCancel operation.
When this operation is invoked, the authenticator MUST perform the following procedure:
-
Check if all the supplied parameters are syntactically well-formed and of the correct length. If not, return an error code equivalent to "
UnknownError
" and terminate the operation. -
Check if at least one of the specified combinations of
PublicKeyCredentialType
and cryptographic parameters in credTypesAndPubKeyAlgs is supported. If not, return an error code equivalent to "NotSupportedError
" and terminate the operation. -
For each descriptor of excludeCredentialDescriptorList:
-
If looking up
descriptor.
in this authenticator returns non-null, and the returned item's RP ID and type matchid
rpEntity.
andid
excludeCredentialDescriptorList.
respectively, then collect an authorization gesture confirming user consent for creating a new credential. The authorization gesture MUST include a test of user presence. If the usertype
- confirms consent to create a new credential
-
return an error code equivalent to "
InvalidStateError
" and terminate the operation. - does not consent to create a new credential
-
return an error code equivalent to "
NotAllowedError
" and terminate the operation.
Note: The purpose of this authorization gesture is not to proceed with creating a credential, but for privacy reasons to authorize disclosure of the fact that
descriptor.
is bound to this authenticator. If the user consents, the client and Relying Party can detect this and guide the user to use a different authenticator. If the user does not consent, the authenticator does not reveal thatid
descriptor.
is bound to it, and responds as if the user simply declined consent to create a credential.id
-
-
If requireResidentKey is
true
and the authenticator cannot store a client-side-resident public key credential source, return an error code equivalent to "ConstraintError
" and terminate the operation. -
If requireUserVerification is
true
and the authenticator cannot perform user verification, return an error code equivalent to "ConstraintError
" and terminate the operation. -
Collect an authorization gesture confirming user consent for creating a new credential.
The prompt for the authorization gesture is shown by the
authenticator if it has its own output capability, or by the user agent otherwise. The prompt SHOULD display
rpEntity.
,id
rpEntity.
,name
userEntity.
andname
userEntity.
, if possible.displayName
If requireUserVerification is
true
, the authorization gesture MUST include user verification.If requireUserPresence is
true
, the authorization gesture MUST include a test of user presence.If the user does not consent or if user verification fails, return an error code equivalent to "
NotAllowedError
" and terminate the operation. -
Once the authorization gesture has been completed and user consent has been obtained, generate a new credential object:
-
Let (publicKey, privateKey) be a new pair of cryptographic keys using the combination of
PublicKeyCredentialType
and cryptographic parameters represented by the first item in credTypesAndPubKeyAlgs that is supported by this authenticator. -
Let userHandle be
userEntity.
.id
-
Let credentialSource be a new public key credential source with the fields:
- type
- privateKey
-
privateKey
- rpId
-
rpEntity.
id
- userHandle
-
userHandle
- otherUI
-
Any other information the authenticator chooses to include.
-
If requireResidentKey is
true
or the authenticator chooses to create a client-side-resident public key credential source:-
Let credentialId be a new credential id.
-
Set credentialSource.id to credentialId.
-
Let credentials be this authenticator’s credentials map.
-
Set credentials[(
rpEntity.
, userHandle)] to credentialSource.id
-
-
Otherwise:
-
Let credentialId be the result of serializing and encrypting credentialSource so that only this authenticator can decrypt it.
-
-
-
If any error occurred while creating the new credential object, return an error code equivalent to "
UnknownError
" and terminate the operation. -
Let processedExtensions be the result of authenticator extension processing for each supported extension identifier → authenticator extension input in extensions.
-
If the authenticator supports:
- a global signature counter
-
Use the global signature counter's actual value when generating authenticator data.
- a per credential signature counter
-
allocate the counter, associate it with the new credential, and initialize the counter value as zero.
- no signature counter
-
let the signature counter value for the new credential be constant at zero.
-
Let attestedCredentialData be the attested credential data byte array including the credentialId and publicKey.
-
Let authenticatorData be the byte array specified in § 6.1 Authenticator Data, including attestedCredentialData as the
attestedCredentialData
and processedExtensions, if any, as theextensions
. -
Return the attestation object for the new credential created by the procedure specified in § 6.5.4 Generating an Attestation Object using an authenticator-chosen attestation statement format, authenticatorData, and hash. For more details on attestation, see § 6.5 Attestation.
On successful completion of this operation, the authenticator returns the attestation object to the client.
6.3.3. The authenticatorGetAssertion Operation
It takes the following input parameters:
- rpId
-
The caller’s RP ID, as determined by the user agent and the client.
- hash
-
The hash of the serialized client data, provided by the client.
- allowCredentialDescriptorList
-
An OPTIONAL list of
PublicKeyCredentialDescriptor
s describing credentials acceptable to the Relying Party (possibly filtered by the client), if any. - requireUserPresence
-
The constant Boolean value
true
. It is included here as a pseudo-parameter to simplify applying this abstract authenticator model to implementations that may wish to make a test of user presence optional although WebAuthn does not. - requireUserVerification
-
The effective user verification requirement for assertion, a Boolean value provided by the client.
- extensions
-
A CBOR map from extension identifiers to their authenticator extension inputs, created by the client based on the extensions requested by the Relying Party, if any.
Note: Before performing this operation, all other operations in progress in the authenticator session MUST be aborted by running the authenticatorCancel operation.
When this method is invoked, the authenticator MUST perform the following procedure:
-
Check if all the supplied parameters are syntactically well-formed and of the correct length. If not, return an error code equivalent to "
UnknownError
" and terminate the operation. -
Let credentialOptions be a new empty set of public key credential sources.
-
If allowCredentialDescriptorList was supplied, then for each descriptor of allowCredentialDescriptorList:
-
Let credSource be the result of looking up
descriptor.
in this authenticator.id
-
If credSource is not
null
, append it to credentialOptions.
-
-
Otherwise (allowCredentialDescriptorList was not supplied), for each key → credSource of this authenticator’s credentials map, append credSource to credentialOptions.
-
Remove any items from credentialOptions whose rpId is not equal to rpId.
-
If credentialOptions is now empty, return an error code equivalent to "
NotAllowedError
" and terminate the operation. -
Prompt the user to select a public key credential source selectedCredential from credentialOptions. Collect an authorization gesture confirming user consent for using selectedCredential. The prompt for the authorization gesture may be shown by the authenticator if it has its own output capability, or by the user agent otherwise.
If requireUserVerification is
true
, the authorization gesture MUST include user verification.If requireUserPresence is
true
, the authorization gesture MUST include a test of user presence.If the user does not consent, return an error code equivalent to "
NotAllowedError
" and terminate the operation. -
Let processedExtensions be the result of authenticator extension processing for each supported extension identifier → authenticator extension input in extensions.
-
Increment the credential associated signature counter or the global signature counter value, depending on which approach is implemented by the authenticator, by some positive value. If the authenticator does not implement a signature counter, let the signature counter value remain constant at zero.
-
Let authenticatorData be the byte array specified in § 6.1 Authenticator Data including processedExtensions, if any, as the
extensions
and excludingattestedCredentialData
. -
Let signature be the assertion signature of the concatenation
authenticatorData || hash
using the privateKey of selectedCredential as shown in Figure , below. A simple, undelimited concatenation is safe to use here because the authenticator data describes its own length. The hash of the serialized client data (which potentially has a variable length) is always the last element. -
If any error occurred while generating the assertion signature, return an error code equivalent to "
UnknownError
" and terminate the operation. -
Return to the user agent:
-
selectedCredential.id, if either a list of credentials (i.e., allowCredentialDescriptorList) of length 2 or greater was supplied by the client, or no such list was supplied.
Note: If, within allowCredentialDescriptorList, the client supplied exactly one credential and it was successfully employed, then its credential ID is not returned since the client already knows it. This saves transmitting these bytes over what may be a constrained connection in what is likely a common case.
-
authenticatorData
-
signature
-
selectedCredential.userHandle
Note: the returned userHandle value may be
null
, see: userHandleResult.
-
If the authenticator cannot find any credential corresponding to the specified Relying Party that matches the specified criteria, it terminates the operation and returns an error.
6.3.4. The authenticatorCancel Operation
This operation takes no input parameters and returns no result.
When this operation is invoked by the client in an authenticator session, it has the effect of terminating any authenticatorMakeCredential or authenticatorGetAssertion operation currently in progress in that authenticator session. The authenticator stops prompting for, or accepting, any user input related to authorizing the canceled operation. The client ignores any further responses from the authenticator for the canceled operation.
This operation is ignored if it is invoked in an authenticator session which does not have an authenticatorMakeCredential or authenticatorGetAssertion operation currently in progress.
6.4. String Handling
Authenticators may be required to store arbitrary strings chosen by a Relying Party, for example the name
and displayName
in a PublicKeyCredentialUserEntity
. Each will have some accommodation for the potentially limited resources available to an authenticator.
If string value truncation is the chosen accommodation then authenticators MAY truncate in order to make the string fit within a length equal or greater than the specified minimum supported length. Such truncation MAY also respect UTF-8 sequence boundaries or grapheme cluster boundaries [UTR29]. This defines the maximum truncation permitted and authenticators MUST NOT truncate further.
For example, in figure the string is 65 bytes long. If truncating to 64 bytes then the final 0x88 byte must be removed purely because of space reasons. Since that leaves a partial UTF-8 sequence the remainder of that sequence may also be removed. Since that leaves a partial grapheme cluster an authenticator may remove the remainder of that cluster.
Conforming User Agents are responsible for ensuring that the authenticator behaviour observed by Relying Parties conforms to this specification with respect to string handling. For example, if an authenticator is known to behave incorrectly when asked to store large strings, the user agent SHOULD perform the truncation for it in order to maintain the model from the point of view of the Relying Party. User-agents that do this SHOULD truncate at grapheme clusters.
Truncation based on UTF-8 sequences alone may cause a grapheme cluster to be truncated, but still valid [UTR29]. This could make the grapheme cluster render as a different valid glyph instead of removing the glyph entirely.
In addition to that, truncating on byte boundaries alone causes a known issue that user agents should be aware of: if the authenticator is using [FIDO-CTAP] then future messages from the authenticator may contain invalid CBOR since the value is typed as a CBOR string and thus is required to be valid UTF-8. User agents are tasked with handling this to avoid burdening authenticators with understanding character encodings and Unicode character properties. Thus, when dealing with authenticators, user agents SHOULD:
-
Ensure that any strings sent to authenticators are validly encoded.
-
Handle the case where strings have been truncated resulting in an invalid encoding. For example, any partial code point at the end may be dropped or replaced with U+FFFD.
6.5. Attestation
Authenticators SHOULD also provide some form of attestation, if possible. If an authenticator does, the basic requirement is that the authenticator can produce, for each credential public key, an attestation statement verifiable by the WebAuthn Relying Party. Typically, this attestation statement contains a signature by an attestation private key over the attested credential public key and a challenge, as well as a certificate or similar data providing provenance information for the attestation public key, enabling the Relying Party to make a trust decision. However, if an attestation key pair is not available, then the authenticator MAY either perform self attestation of the credential public key with the corresponding credential private key, or otherwise perform no attestation. All this information is returned by authenticators any time a new public key credential is generated, in the overall form of an attestation object. The relationship of the attestation object with authenticator data (containing attested credential data) and the attestation statement is illustrated in figure , below.
If an authenticator employs self attestation or no attestation, then no provenance information is provided for the Relying Party to base a trust decision on. In these cases, the authenticator provides no guarantees about its operation to the Relying Party.
packed
attestation statement format. Several additional attestation statement
formats are defined in § 8 Defined Attestation Statement Formats. An important component of the attestation object is the attestation statement. This is a specific type of signed data object, containing statements about a public key credential itself and the authenticator that created it. It contains an attestation signature created using the key of the attesting authority (except for the case of self attestation, when it is created using the credential private key). In order to correctly interpret an attestation statement, a Relying Party needs to understand these two aspects of attestation:
-
The attestation statement format is the manner in which the signature is represented and the various contextual bindings are incorporated into the attestation statement by the authenticator. In other words, this defines the syntax of the statement. Various existing components and OS platforms (such as TPMs and the Android OS) have previously defined attestation statement formats. This specification supports a variety of such formats in an extensible way, as defined in § 6.5.2 Attestation Statement Formats. The formats themselves are identified by strings, as described in § 8.1 Attestation Statement Format Identifiers.
-
The attestation type defines the semantics of attestation statements and their underlying trust models. Specifically, it defines how a Relying Party establishes trust in a particular attestation statement, after verifying that it is cryptographically valid. This specification supports a number of attestation types, as described in § 6.5.3 Attestation Types.
In general, there is no simple mapping between attestation statement formats and attestation types. For example, the "packed" attestation statement format defined in § 8.2 Packed Attestation Statement Format can be used in conjunction with all attestation types, while other formats and types have more limited applicability.
The privacy, security and operational characteristics of attestation depend on:
-
The attestation type, which determines the trust model,
-
The attestation statement format, which MAY constrain the strength of the attestation by limiting what can be expressed in an attestation statement, and
-
The characteristics of the individual authenticator, such as its construction, whether part or all of it runs in a secure operating environment, and so on.
It is expected that most authenticators will support a small number of attestation types and attestation statement formats, while Relying Parties will decide what attestation types are acceptable to them by policy. Relying Parties will also need to understand the characteristics of the authenticators that they trust, based on information they have about these authenticators. For example, the FIDO Metadata Service [FIDOMetadataService] provides one way to access such information.
6.5.1. Attested Credential Data
Attested credential data is a variable-length byte array added to the authenticator data when generating an attestation object for a given credential. Its format is shown in Table .
Name | Length (in bytes) | Description |
---|---|---|
aaguid | 16 | The AAGUID of the authenticator. |
credentialIdLength | 2 | Byte length L of Credential ID, 16-bit unsigned big-endian integer. |
credentialId | L | Credential ID |
credentialPublicKey | variable | The credential public key encoded in COSE_Key format,
as defined in Section 7 of [RFC8152], using the CTAP2 canonical CBOR encoding form.
The COSE_Key-encoded credential public key MUST contain the "alg" parameter and MUST NOT
contain any other OPTIONAL parameters. The "alg" parameter MUST contain a COSEAlgorithmIdentifier value.
The encoded credential public key MUST also contain any additional REQUIRED parameters stipulated by the
relevant key type specification, i.e., REQUIRED for the key type "kty" and algorithm "alg" (see Section 8 of [RFC8152]).
|
6.5.1.1. Examples of credentialPublicKey
Values Encoded in COSE_Key Format
This section provides examples of COSE_Key-encoded Elliptic Curve and RSA public keys for the ES256, PS256, and RS256 signature algorithms. These examples adhere to the rules defined above for the credentialPublicKey value, and are presented in CDDL [RFC8610] for clarity.
[RFC8152] Section 7 defines the general framework for all COSE_Key-encoded keys. Specific key types for specific algorithms are defined in other sections of [RFC8152] as well as in other specifications, as noted below.
Below is an example of a COSE_Key-encoded Elliptic Curve public key in EC2 format (see [RFC8152] Section 13.1), on the P-256 curve, to be used with the ES256 signature algorithm (ECDSA w/ SHA-256, see [RFC8152] Section 8.1:
{ 1: 2, ; kty: EC2 key type 3: -7, ; alg: ES256 signature algorithm -1: 1, ; crv: P-256 curve -2: x, ; x-coordinate as byte string 32 bytes in length ; e.g., in hex: 65eda5a12577c2bae829437fe338701a10aaa375e1bb5b5de108de439c08551d -3: y ; y-coordinate as byte string 32 bytes in length ; e.g., in hex: 1e52ed75701163f7f9e40ddf9f341b3dc9ba860af7e0ca7ca7e9eecd0084d19c}
Below is the above Elliptic Curve public key encoded in the CTAP2 canonical CBOR encoding form, whitespace and line breaks are included here for clarity and to match the CDDL [RFC8610] presentation above:
A5 01 02 03 26 20 01 21 58 20 65 eda5 a12577 c2 bae829437 fe338701 a10 aaa375e1 bb5 b5 de108 de439 c08551 d22 58 20 1e52 ed75701163 f7 f9e40 ddf9 f341 b3 dc9 ba860 af7e0 ca7 ca7e9 eecd0084 d19 c
Below is an example of a COSE_Key-encoded 2048-bit RSA public key (see [RFC8230] Section 4, to be used with the PS256 signature algorithm (RSASSA-PSS with SHA-256, see [RFC8230] Section 2:
{ 1: 3, ; kty: RSA key type 3: -37, ; alg: PS256 -1: n, ; n: RSA modulus n byte string 256 bytes in length ; e.g., in hex (middle bytes elided for brevity): DB5F651550...6DC6548ACC3 -2: e ; e: RSA public exponent e byte string 3 bytes in length ; e.g., in hex: 010001}
Below is an example of the same COSE_Key-encoded RSA public key as above, to be used with the RS256 signature algorithm (RSASSA-PKCS1-v1_5 with SHA-256, see § 12.3 COSE Algorithm Registrations):
{ 1: 3, ; kty: RSA key type 3:-257, ; alg: RS256 -1: n, ; n: RSA modulus n byte string 256 bytes in length ; e.g., in hex (middle bytes elided for brevity): DB5F651550...6DC6548ACC3 -2: e ; e: RSA public exponent e byte string 3 bytes in length ; e.g., in hex: 010001}
6.5.2. Attestation Statement Formats
As described above, an attestation statement format is a data format which represents a cryptographic signature by an authenticator over a set of contextual bindings. Each attestation statement format MUST be defined using the following template:
-
Supported attestation types:
-
Syntax: The syntax of an attestation statement produced in this format, defined using CDDL [RFC8610] for the extension point
$attStmtFormat
defined in § 6.5.4 Generating an Attestation Object. -
Signing procedure: The signing procedure for computing an attestation statement in this format given the public key credential to be attested, the authenticator data structure containing the authenticator data for the attestation, and the hash of the serialized client data.
-
Verification procedure: The procedure for verifying an attestation statement, which takes the following verification procedure inputs:
-
attStmt: The attestation statement structure
-
authenticatorData: The authenticator data claimed to have been used for the attestation
-
clientDataHash: The hash of the serialized client data
The procedure returns either:
-
An error indicating that the attestation is invalid, or
-
An implementation-specific value representing the attestation type, and the trust path. This attestation trust path is either empty (in case of self attestation), an identifier of an ECDAA-Issuer public key (in the case of ECDAA), or a set of X.509 certificates.
-
The initial list of specified attestation statement formats is in § 8 Defined Attestation Statement Formats.
6.5.3. Attestation Types
WebAuthn supports several attestation types, defining the semantics of attestation statements and their underlying trust models:
Note: This specification does not define any data structures explicitly expressing the attestation types employed by authenticators. Relying Parties engaging in attestation statement verification — i.e., when
calling navigator.credentials.create()
they select an attestation conveyance other than none
and verify the received attestation statement — will determine the employed attestation type as a part of verification. See the "Verification procedure" subsections of § 8 Defined Attestation Statement Formats. See also § 14.4.1 Attestation Privacy.
- Basic Attestation (Basic)
-
In the case of basic attestation [UAFProtocol], the authenticator’s attestation key pair is specific to an authenticator model. Thus, authenticators of the same model often share the same attestation key pair. See § 14.4.1 Attestation Privacy for further information.
Basic attestation is sometimes also called batch attestation.
- Self Attestation (Self)
-
In the case of self attestation, also known as surrogate basic attestation [UAFProtocol], the Authenticator does not have any specific attestation key pair. Instead it uses the credential private key to create the attestation signature. Authenticators without meaningful protection measures for an attestation private key typically use this attestation type.
- Attestation CA (AttCA)
-
In this case, an authenticator is based on a Trusted Platform Module (TPM) and holds an authenticator-specific "endorsement key" (EK). This key is used to securely communicate with a trusted third party, the Attestation CA [TCG-CMCProfile-AIKCertEnroll] (formerly known as a "Privacy CA"). The authenticator can generate multiple attestation identity key pairs (AIK) and requests an Attestation CA to issue an AIK certificate for each. Using this approach, such an authenticator can limit the exposure of the EK (which is a global correlation handle) to Attestation CA(s). AIKs can be requested for each authenticator-generated public key credential individually, and conveyed to Relying Parties as attestation certificates.
Note: This concept typically leads to multiple attestation certificates. The attestation certificate requested most recently is called "active".
Note: Attestation statements conveying attestations of type AttCA use the same data structure as attestation statements conveying attestations of type Basic, so the two attestation types are, in general, distinguishable only with externally provided knowledge regarding the contents of the attestation certificates conveyed in the attestation statement.
- Elliptic Curve based Direct Anonymous Attestation (ECDAA)
-
In this case, the Authenticator receives direct anonymous attestation (DAA) credentials from a single DAA-Issuer. These DAA credentials are used along with blinding to sign the attested credential data. The concept of blinding avoids the DAA credentials being misused as global correlation handle. WebAuthn supports DAA using elliptic curve cryptography and bilinear pairings, called ECDAA (see [FIDOEcdaaAlgorithm]) in this specification. Consequently we denote the DAA-Issuer as ECDAA-Issuer (see [FIDOEcdaaAlgorithm]).
- No attestation statement (None)
-
In this case, no attestation information is available. See also § 8.7 None Attestation Statement Format.
6.5.4. Generating an Attestation Object
To generate an attestation object (see: Figure 6) given:
- attestationFormat
- authData
-
A byte array containing authenticator data.
- hash
the authenticator MUST:
-
Let attStmt be the result of running attestationFormat’s signing procedure given authData and hash.
-
Let fmt be attestationFormat’s attestation statement format identifier
-
Return the attestation object as a CBOR map with the following syntax, filled in with variables initialized by this algorithm:
attObj = { authData: bytes, $$attStmtType } attStmtTemplate = ( fmt: text, attStmt: { * tstr => any } ; Map is filled in by each concrete attStmtType ) ; Every attestation statement format must have the above fields attStmtTemplate .within $$attStmtType
6.5.5. Signature Formats for Packed Attestation, FIDO U2F Attestation, and Assertion Signatures
-
For COSEAlgorithmIdentifier -7 (ES256), and other ECDSA-based algorithms, a signature value is encoded as an ASN.1 DER Ecdsa-Sig-Value, as defined in [RFC3279] section 2.2.3.
Example: 30 44 ; SEQUENCE (68 Bytes) 02 20 ; INTEGER (32 Bytes) | 3d 46 28 7b 8c 6e 8c 8c 26 1c 1b 88 f2 73 b0 9a | 32 a6 cf 28 09 fd 6e 30 d5 a7 9f 26 37 00 8f 54 02 20 ; INTEGER (32 Bytes) | 4e 72 23 6e a3 90 a9 a1 7b cf 5f 7a 09 d6 3a b2 | 17 6c 92 bb 8e 36 c0 41 98 a2 7b 90 9b 6e 8f 13
Note: As CTAP1/U2F authenticators are already producing signatures values in this format, CTAP2 authenticators will also produce signatures values in the same format, for consistency reasons. It is recommended that any new attestation formats defined not use ASN.1 encodings, but instead represent signatures as equivalent fixed-length byte arrays without internal structure, using the same representations as used by COSE signatures as defined in [RFC8152] and [RFC8230].
-
For COSEAlgorithmIdentifier -257 (RS256),
sig
contains the signature generated using the RSASSA-PKCS1-v1_5 signature scheme defined in section 8.2.1 in [RFC8017] with SHA-256 as the hash function. The signature is not ASN.1 wrapped. -
For COSEAlgorithmIdentifier -37 (PS256),
sig
contains the signature generated using the RSASSA-PSS signature scheme defined in section 8.1.1 in [RFC8017] with SHA-256 as the hash function. The signature is not ASN.1 wrapped.
7. WebAuthn Relying Party Operations
A registration or authentication ceremony begins with the WebAuthn Relying Party creating a PublicKeyCredentialCreationOptions
or PublicKeyCredentialRequestOptions
object, respectively, which encodes the parameters for the ceremony. The Relying Party SHOULD take care to not leak sensitive information during this stage; see § 14.6.2 Username Enumeration for details.
Upon successful execution of create()
or get()
, the Relying Party's script receives
a PublicKeyCredential
containing an AuthenticatorAttestationResponse
or AuthenticatorAssertionResponse
structure,
respectively, from the client. It must then deliver the contents of this structure to the Relying Party server, using methods outside
the scope of this specification. This section describes the operations that the Relying Party must perform upon receipt of these
structures.
7.1. Registering a New Credential
In order to perform a registration ceremony, the Relying Party MUST proceed as follows:
-
Let options be a new
PublicKeyCredentialCreationOptions
structure configured to the Relying Party's needs for the ceremony. -
Call
navigator.credentials.create()
and pass options as the
option. Let credential be the result of the successfully resolved promise. If the promise is rejected, abort the ceremony with a user-visible error.publicKey
-
Let response be
credential.
. If response is not an instance ofresponse
AuthenticatorAttestationResponse
, abort the ceremony with a user-visible error. -
Let clientExtensionResults be the result of calling
credential.
.getClientExtensionResults()
-
Let JSONtext be the result of running UTF-8 decode on the value of
response.
.clientDataJSON
Note: Using any implementation of UTF-8 decode is acceptable as long as it yields the same result as that yielded by the UTF-8 decode algorithm. In particular, any leading byte order mark (BOM) MUST be stripped.
-
Let C, the client data claimed as collected during the credential creation, be the result of running an implementation-specific JSON parser on JSONtext.
Note: C may be any implementation-specific data structure representation, as long as C’s components are referenceable, as required by this algorithm.
-
Verify that the value of
C.
istype
webauthn.create
. -
Verify that the value of
C.
equals the base64url encoding ofchallenge
options.
.challenge
-
Verify that the value of
C.
matches the Relying Party's origin.origin
-
Verify that the value of
C.
matches the state of Token Binding for the TLS connection over which the assertion was obtained. If Token Binding was used on that TLS connection, also verify thattokenBinding
.status
C.
matches the base64url encoding of the Token Binding ID for the connection.tokenBinding
.id
-
Let hash be the result of computing a hash over
response.
using SHA-256.clientDataJSON
-
Perform CBOR decoding on the
attestationObject
field of theAuthenticatorAttestationResponse
structure to obtain the attestation statement format fmt, the authenticator data authData, and the attestation statement attStmt. -
Verify that the
rpIdHash
in authData is the SHA-256 hash of the RP ID expected by the Relying Party. -
Verify that the User Present bit of the
flags
in authData is set. -
If user verification is required for this registration, verify that the User Verified bit of the
flags
in authData is set. -
Verify that the "alg" parameter in the credential public key in authData matches the
alg
attribute of one of the items inoptions.
.pubKeyCredParams
-
Verify that the values of the client extension outputs in clientExtensionResults and the authenticator extension outputs in the
extensions
in authData are as expected, considering the client extension input values that were given inoptions.
and any specific policy of the Relying Party regarding unsolicited extensions, i.e., those that were not specified as part ofextensions
options.
. In the general case, the meaning of "are as expected" is specific to the Relying Party and which extensions are in use.extensions
Note: Client platforms MAY enact local policy that sets additional authenticator extensions or client extensions and thus cause values to appear in the authenticator extension outputs or client extension outputs that were not originally specified as part of
options.
. Relying Parties MUST be prepared to handle such situations, whether it be to ignore the unsolicited extensions or reject the attestation. The Relying Party can make this decision based on local policy and the extensions in use.extensions
Note: Since all extensions are OPTIONAL for both the client and the authenticator, the Relying Party MUST also be prepared to handle cases where none or not all of the requested extensions were acted upon.
-
Determine the attestation statement format by performing a USASCII case-sensitive match on fmt against the set of supported WebAuthn Attestation Statement Format Identifier values. An up-to-date list of registered WebAuthn Attestation Statement Format Identifier values is maintained in the IANA registry of the same name [WebAuthn-Registries].
-
Verify that attStmt is a correct attestation statement, conveying a valid attestation signature, by using the attestation statement format fmt’s verification procedure given attStmt, authData and hash.
Note: Each attestation statement format specifies its own verification procedure. See § 8 Defined Attestation Statement Formats for the initially-defined formats, and [WebAuthn-Registries] for the up-to-date list.
-
If validation is successful, obtain a list of acceptable trust anchors (attestation root certificates or ECDAA-Issuer public keys) for that attestation type and attestation statement format fmt, from a trusted source or from policy. For example, the FIDO Metadata Service [FIDOMetadataService] provides one way to obtain such information, using the
aaguid
in theattestedCredentialData
in authData. -
Assess the attestation trustworthiness using the outputs of the verification procedure in step 19, as follows:
-
If no attestation was provided, verify that None attestation is acceptable under Relying Party policy.
-
If self attestation was used, verify that self attestation is acceptable under Relying Party policy.
-
If ECDAA was used, verify that the identifier of the ECDAA-Issuer public key, returned as the attestation trust path from the verification procedure, is included in the set of acceptable trust anchors obtained in step 20.
-
Otherwise, use the X.509 certificates returned as the attestation trust path from the verification procedure to verify that the attestation public key correctly chains up to an acceptable root certificate.
-
-
Check that the
credentialId
is not yet registered to any other user. If registration is requested for a credential that is already registered to a different user, the Relying Party SHOULD fail this registration ceremony, or it MAY decide to accept the registration, e.g. while deleting the older registration. -
If the attestation statement attStmt verified successfully and is found to be trustworthy, then register the new credential with the account that was denoted in
options.
:user
-
Associate the user’s account with the
credentialId
andcredentialPublicKey
inauthData.attestedCredentialData
, as appropriate for the Relying Party's system. -
Associate the
credentialId
with a new stored signature counter value initialized to the value ofauthData.signCount
.
It is RECOMMENDED to also:
-
Associate the
credentialId
with the transport hints returned by callingcredential.
. It is RECOMMENDED to use these to populate thegetTransports()
transports
of theallowCredentials
option in futureget()
calls to help the client know how to find a suitable authenticator.
-
-
If the attestation statement attStmt successfully verified but is not trustworthy per step 21 above, the Relying Party SHOULD fail the registration ceremony.
NOTE: However, if permitted by policy, the Relying Party MAY register the credential ID and credential public key but treat the credential as one with self attestation (see § 6.5.3 Attestation Types). If doing so, the Relying Party is asserting there is no cryptographic proof that the public key credential has been generated by a particular authenticator model. See [FIDOSecRef] and [UAFProtocol] for a more detailed discussion.
Verification of attestation objects requires that the Relying Party has a trusted method of determining acceptable trust anchors in step 20 above. Also, if certificates are being used, the Relying Party MUST have access to certificate status information for the intermediate CA certificates. The Relying Party MUST also be able to build the attestation certificate chain if the client did not provide this chain in the attestation information.
7.2. Verifying an Authentication Assertion
In order to perform an authentication ceremony, the Relying Party MUST proceed as follows:
-
Let options be a new
PublicKeyCredentialRequestOptions
structure configured to the Relying Party's needs for the ceremony. -
Call
navigator.credentials.get()
and pass options as the
option. Let credential be the result of the successfully resolved promise. If the promise is rejected, abort the ceremony with a user-visible error.publicKey
-
Let response be
credential.
. If response is not an instance ofresponse
AuthenticatorAssertionResponse
, abort the ceremony with a user-visible error. -
Let clientExtensionResults be the result of calling
credential.
.getClientExtensionResults()
-
If
options.
is not empty, verify thatallowCredentials
credential.
identifies one of the public key credentials listed inid
options.
.allowCredentials
-
Identify the user being authenticated and verify that this user is the owner of the public key credential source credentialSource identified by
credential.
:id
- If the user was identified before the authentication ceremony was initiated, e.g., via a username or cookie,
-
verify that the identified user is the owner of credentialSource. If
response.
is present, let userHandle be its value. Verify that userHandle also maps to the same user.userHandle
- If the user was not identified before the authentication ceremony was initiated,
-
verify that
response.
is present, and that the user identified by this value is the owner of credentialSource.userHandle
-
Using
credential.
(orid
credential.
, if base64url encoding is inappropriate for your use case), look up the corresponding credential public key and let credentialPublicKey be that credential public key.rawId
-
Let cData, authData and sig denote the value of response’s
clientDataJSON
,authenticatorData
, andsignature
respectively. -
Let JSONtext be the result of running UTF-8 decode on the value of cData.
Note: Using any implementation of UTF-8 decode is acceptable as long as it yields the same result as that yielded by the UTF-8 decode algorithm. In particular, any leading byte order mark (BOM) MUST be stripped.
-
Let C, the client data claimed as used for the signature, be the result of running an implementation-specific JSON parser on JSONtext.
Note: C may be any implementation-specific data structure representation, as long as C’s components are referenceable, as required by this algorithm.
-
Verify that the value of
C.
is the stringtype
webauthn.get
. -
Verify that the value of
C.
equals the base64url encoding ofchallenge
options.
.challenge
-
Verify that the value of
C.
matches the Relying Party's origin.origin
-
Verify that the value of
C.
matches the state of Token Binding for the TLS connection over which the attestation was obtained. If Token Binding was used on that TLS connection, also verify thattokenBinding
.status
C.
matches the base64url encoding of the Token Binding ID for the connection.tokenBinding
.id
-
Verify that the
rpIdHash
in authData is the SHA-256 hash of the RP ID expected by the Relying Party.Note: If using the appid extension, this step needs some special logic. See § 10.1 FIDO AppID Extension (appid) for details.
-
Verify that the User Present bit of the
flags
in authData is set. -
If user verification is required for this assertion, verify that the User Verified bit of the
flags
in authData is set. -
Verify that the values of the client extension outputs in clientExtensionResults and the authenticator extension outputs in the
extensions
in authData are as expected, considering the client extension input values that were given inoptions.
and any specific policy of the Relying Party regarding unsolicited extensions, i.e., those that were not specified as part ofextensions
options.
. In the general case, the meaning of "are as expected" is specific to the Relying Party and which extensions are in use.extensions
Note: Client platforms MAY enact local policy that sets additional authenticator extensions or client extensions and thus cause values to appear in the authenticator extension outputs or client extension outputs that were not originally specified as part of
options.
. Relying Parties MUST be prepared to handle such situations, whether it be to ignore the unsolicited extensions or reject the assertion. The Relying Party can make this decision based on local policy and the extensions in use.extensions
Note: Since all extensions are OPTIONAL for both the client and the authenticator, the Relying Party MUST also be prepared to handle cases where none or not all of the requested extensions were acted upon.
-
Let hash be the result of computing a hash over the cData using SHA-256.
-
Using credentialPublicKey, verify that sig is a valid signature over the binary concatenation of authData and hash.
Note: This verification step is compatible with signatures generated by FIDO U2F authenticators. See § 6.1.2 FIDO U2F Signature Format Compatibility.
-
Let storedSignCount be the stored signature counter value associated with
credential.
. If authData.id
signCount
is nonzero or storedSignCount is nonzero, then run the following sub-step:-
If authData.
signCount
is- greater than storedSignCount:
- Update storedSignCount to be the value of authData.
signCount
. - less than or equal to storedSignCount:
- This is a signal that the authenticator may be cloned, i.e. at least two copies of the credential private key may exist and are being used in parallel. Relying Parties should incorporate this information into their risk scoring. Whether the Relying Party updates storedSignCount in this case, or not, or fails the authentication ceremony or not, is Relying Party-specific.
-
-
If all the above steps are successful, continue with the authentication ceremony as appropriate. Otherwise, fail the authentication ceremony.
8. Defined Attestation Statement Formats
WebAuthn supports pluggable attestation statement formats. This section defines an initial set of such formats.
8.1. Attestation Statement Format Identifiers
Attestation statement formats are identified by a string, called an attestation statement format identifier, chosen by the author of the attestation statement format.
Attestation statement format identifiers SHOULD be registered per [WebAuthn-Registries] "Registries for Web Authentication (WebAuthn)". All registered attestation statement format identifiers are unique amongst themselves as a matter of course.
Unregistered attestation statement format identifiers SHOULD use lowercase reverse domain-name naming, using a domain name registered by the developer, in order to assure uniqueness of the identifier. All attestation statement format identifiers MUST be a maximum of 32 octets in length and MUST consist only of printable USASCII characters, excluding backslash and doublequote, i.e., VCHAR as defined in [RFC5234] but without %x22 and %x5c.
Note: This means attestation statement format identifiers based on domain names MUST incorporate only LDH Labels [RFC5890].
Implementations MUST match WebAuthn attestation statement format identifiers in a case-sensitive fashion.
Attestation statement formats that may exist in multiple versions SHOULD include a version in their identifier. In effect,
different versions are thus treated as different formats, e.g., packed2
as a new version of the § 8.2 Packed Attestation Statement Format.
The following sections present a set of currently-defined and registered attestation statement formats and their identifiers. The up-to-date list of registered WebAuthn Extensions is maintained in the IANA "WebAuthn Attestation Statement Format Identifier" registry established by [WebAuthn-Registries].
8.2. Packed Attestation Statement Format
This is a WebAuthn optimized attestation statement format. It uses a very compact but still extensible encoding method. It is implementable by authenticators with limited resources (e.g., secure elements).
- Attestation statement format identifier
-
packed
- Attestation types supported
- Syntax
-
The syntax of a Packed Attestation statement is defined by the following CDDL:
$$attStmtType //= ( fmt: "packed", attStmt: packedStmtFormat ) packedStmtFormat = { alg: COSEAlgorithmIdentifier, sig: bytes, x5c: [ attestnCert: bytes, * (caCert: bytes) ] } // { alg: COSEAlgorithmIdentifier, (-260 for ED256 / -261 for ED512) sig: bytes, ecdaaKeyId: bytes } // { alg: COSEAlgorithmIdentifier sig: bytes, }
The semantics of the fields are as follows:
- alg
-
A
COSEAlgorithmIdentifier
containing the identifier of the algorithm used to generate the attestation signature. - sig
-
A byte string containing the attestation signature.
- x5c
-
The elements of this array contain attestnCert and its certificate chain, each encoded in X.509 format. The attestation certificate attestnCert MUST be the first element in the array.
- attestnCert
-
The attestation certificate, encoded in X.509 format.
- ecdaaKeyId
-
The identifier of the ECDAA-Issuer public key. This is the BigNumberToB encoding of the component "c" of the ECDAA-Issuer public key as defined section 3.3, step 3.5 in [FIDOEcdaaAlgorithm].
- Signing procedure
-
The signing procedure for this attestation statement format is similar to the procedure for generating assertion signatures.
-
Let authenticatorData denote the authenticator data for the attestation, and let clientDataHash denote the hash of the serialized client data.
-
If Basic or AttCA attestation is in use, the authenticator produces the sig by concatenating authenticatorData and clientDataHash, and signing the result using an attestation private key selected through an authenticator-specific mechanism. It sets x5c to the certificate chain of the attestation public key and alg to the algorithm of the attestation private key.
-
If ECDAA is in use, the authenticator produces sig by concatenating authenticatorData and clientDataHash, and signing the result using ECDAA-Sign (see section 3.5 of [FIDOEcdaaAlgorithm]) after selecting an ECDAA-Issuer public key related to the ECDAA signature private key through an authenticator-specific mechanism (see [FIDOEcdaaAlgorithm]). It sets alg to the algorithm of the selected ECDAA-Issuer public key and ecdaaKeyId to the identifier of the ECDAA-Issuer public key (see above).
-
If self attestation is in use, the authenticator produces sig by concatenating authenticatorData and clientDataHash, and signing the result using the credential private key. It sets alg to the algorithm of the credential private key and omits the other fields.
-
- Verification procedure
-
Given the verification procedure inputs attStmt, authenticatorData and clientDataHash, the verification procedure is as follows:
-
Verify that attStmt is valid CBOR conforming to the syntax defined above and perform CBOR decoding on it to extract the contained fields.
-
If x5c is present, this indicates that the attestation type is not ECDAA. In this case:
-
Verify that sig is a valid signature over the concatenation of authenticatorData and clientDataHash using the attestation public key in attestnCert with the algorithm specified in alg.
-
Verify that attestnCert meets the requirements in § 8.2.1 Packed Attestation Statement Certificate Requirements.
-
If attestnCert contains an extension with OID 1.3.6.1.4.1.45724.1.1.4 (
id-fido-gen-ce-aaguid
) verify that the value of this extension matches theaaguid
in authenticatorData. -
Optionally, inspect x5c and consult externally provided knowledge to determine whether attStmt conveys a Basic or AttCA attestation.
-
If successful, return implementation-specific values representing attestation type Basic, AttCA or uncertainty, and attestation trust path x5c.
-
-
If ecdaaKeyId is present, then the attestation type is ECDAA. In this case:
-
Verify that sig is a valid signature over the concatenation of authenticatorData and clientDataHash using ECDAA-Verify with ECDAA-Issuer public key identified by ecdaaKeyId (see [FIDOEcdaaAlgorithm]).
-
If successful, return implementation-specific values representing attestation type ECDAA and attestation trust path ecdaaKeyId.
-
-
If neither x5c nor ecdaaKeyId is present, self attestation is in use.
-
Validate that alg matches the algorithm of the
credentialPublicKey
in authenticatorData. -
Verify that sig is a valid signature over the concatenation of authenticatorData and clientDataHash using the credential public key with alg.
-
If successful, return implementation-specific values representing attestation type Self and an empty attestation trust path.
-
-
8.2.1. Packed Attestation Statement Certificate Requirements
The attestation certificate MUST have the following fields/extensions:
-
Version MUST be set to 3 (which is indicated by an ASN.1 INTEGER with value 2).
-
Subject field MUST be set to:
- Subject-C
-
ISO 3166 code specifying the country where the Authenticator vendor is incorporated (PrintableString)
- Subject-O
-
Legal name of the Authenticator vendor (UTF8String)
- Subject-OU
-
Literal string “Authenticator Attestation” (UTF8String)
- Subject-CN
-
A UTF8String of the vendor’s choosing
-
If the related attestation root certificate is used for multiple authenticator models, the Extension OID 1.3.6.1.4.1.45724.1.1.4 (
id-fido-gen-ce-aaguid
) MUST be present, containing the AAGUID as a 16-byte OCTET STRING. The extension MUST NOT be marked as critical.Note that an X.509 Extension encodes the DER-encoding of the value in an OCTET STRING. Thus, the AAGUID MUST be wrapped in two OCTET STRINGS to be valid. Here is a sample, encoded Extension structure:
30 21 -- SEQUENCE 06 0b 2b 06 01 04 01 82 e5 1c 01 01 04 -- 1.3.6.1.4.1.45724.1.1.4 04 12 -- OCTET STRING 04 10 -- OCTET STRING cd 8c 39 5c 26 ed ee de -- AAGUID 65 3b 00 79 7d 03 ca 3c
-
The Basic Constraints extension MUST have the CA component set to
false
. -
An Authority Information Access (AIA) extension with entry
id-ad-ocsp
and a CRL Distribution Point extension [RFC5280] are both OPTIONAL as the status of many attestation certificates is available through authenticator metadata services. See, for example, the FIDO Metadata Service [FIDOMetadataService].
8.3. TPM Attestation Statement Format
This attestation statement format is generally used by authenticators that use a Trusted Platform Module as their cryptographic engine.
- Attestation statement format identifier
-
tpm
- Attestation types supported
- Syntax
-
The syntax of a TPM Attestation statement is as follows:
$$attStmtType // = ( fmt: "tpm", attStmt: tpmStmtFormat ) tpmStmtFormat = { ver: "2.0", ( alg: COSEAlgorithmIdentifier, x5c: [ aikCert: bytes, * (caCert: bytes) ] ) // ( alg: COSEAlgorithmIdentifier, (-260 for ED256 / -261 for ED512) ecdaaKeyId: bytes ), sig: bytes, certInfo: bytes, pubArea: bytes }
The semantics of the above fields are as follows:
- ver
-
The version of the TPM specification to which the signature conforms.
- alg
-
A
COSEAlgorithmIdentifier
containing the identifier of the algorithm used to generate the attestation signature. - x5c
-
aikCert followed by its certificate chain, in X.509 encoding.
- aikCert
-
The AIK certificate used for the attestation, in X.509 encoding.
- ecdaaKeyId
-
The identifier of the ECDAA-Issuer public key. This is the BigNumberToB encoding of the component "c" as defined section 3.3, step 3.5 in [FIDOEcdaaAlgorithm].
- sig
-
The attestation signature, in the form of a TPMT_SIGNATURE structure as specified in [TPMv2-Part2] section 11.3.4.
- certInfo
-
The TPMS_ATTEST structure over which the above signature was computed, as specified in [TPMv2-Part2] section 10.12.8.
- pubArea
-
The TPMT_PUBLIC structure (see [TPMv2-Part2] section 12.2.4) used by the TPM to represent the credential public key.
- Signing procedure
-
Let authenticatorData denote the authenticator data for the attestation, and let clientDataHash denote the hash of the serialized client data.
Concatenate authenticatorData and clientDataHash to form attToBeSigned.
Generate a signature using the procedure specified in [TPMv2-Part3] Section 18.2, using the attestation private key and setting the
extraData
parameter to the digest of attToBeSigned using the hash algorithm corresponding to the "alg" signature algorithm. (For the "RS256" algorithm, this would be a SHA-256 digest.)Set the pubArea field to the public area of the credential public key, the certInfo field to the output parameter of the same name, and the sig field to the signature obtained from the above procedure.
- Verification procedure
-
Given the verification procedure inputs attStmt, authenticatorData and clientDataHash, the verification procedure is as follows:
Verify that attStmt is valid CBOR conforming to the syntax defined above and perform CBOR decoding on it to extract the contained fields.
Verify that the public key specified by the
parameters
andunique
fields of pubArea is identical to thecredentialPublicKey
in theattestedCredentialData
in authenticatorData.Concatenate authenticatorData and clientDataHash to form attToBeSigned.
Validate that certInfo is valid:
-
Verify that
magic
is set toTPM_GENERATED_VALUE
. -
Verify that
type
is set toTPM_ST_ATTEST_CERTIFY
. -
Verify that
extraData
is set to the hash of attToBeSigned using the hash algorithm employed in "alg". -
Verify that
attested
contains aTPMS_CERTIFY_INFO
structure as specified in [TPMv2-Part2] section 10.12.3, whosename
field contains a valid Name for pubArea, as computed using the algorithm in thenameAlg
field of pubArea using the procedure specified in [TPMv2-Part1] section 16. -
Note that the remaining fields in the "Standard Attestation Structure" [TPMv2-Part1] section 31.2, i.e.,
qualifiedSigner
,clockInfo
andfirmwareVersion
are ignored. These fields MAY be used as an input to risk engines.
If x5c is present, this indicates that the attestation type is not ECDAA. In this case:
-
Verify the sig is a valid signature over certInfo using the attestation public key in aikCert with the algorithm specified in alg.
-
Verify that aikCert meets the requirements in § 8.3.1 TPM Attestation Statement Certificate Requirements.
-
If aikCert contains an extension with OID
1 3 6 1 4 1 45724 1 1 4
(id-fido-gen-ce-aaguid) verify that the value of this extension matches theaaguid
in authenticatorData. -
If successful, return implementation-specific values representing attestation type AttCA and attestation trust path x5c.
If ecdaaKeyId is present, then the attestation type is ECDAA.
-
Perform ECDAA-Verify on sig to verify that it is a valid signature over certInfo (see [FIDOEcdaaAlgorithm]).
-
If successful, return implementation-specific values representing attestation type ECDAA and attestation trust path ecdaaKeyId.
-
8.3.1. TPM Attestation Statement Certificate Requirements
TPM attestation certificate MUST have the following fields/extensions:
-
Version MUST be set to 3.
-
Subject field MUST be set to empty.
-
The Subject Alternative Name extension MUST be set as defined in [TPMv2-EK-Profile] section 3.2.9.
-
The Extended Key Usage extension MUST contain the "joint-iso-itu-t(2) internationalorganizations(23) 133 tcg-kp(8) tcg-kp-AIKCertificate(3)" OID.
-
The Basic Constraints extension MUST have the CA component set to
false
. -
An Authority Information Access (AIA) extension with entry
id-ad-ocsp
and a CRL Distribution Point extension [RFC5280] are both OPTIONAL as the status of many attestation certificates is available through metadata services. See, for example, the FIDO Metadata Service [FIDOMetadataService].
8.4. Android Key Attestation Statement Format
When the authenticator in question is a platform authenticator on the Android "N" or later platform, the attestation statement is based on the Android key attestation. In these cases, the attestation statement is produced by a component running in a secure operating environment, but the authenticator data for the attestation is produced outside this environment. The WebAuthn Relying Party is expected to check that the authenticator data claimed to have been used for the attestation is consistent with the fields of the attestation certificate’s extension data.
- Attestation statement format identifier
-
android-key
- Attestation types supported
- Syntax
-
An Android key attestation statement consists simply of the Android attestation statement, which is a series of DER encoded X.509 certificates. See the Android developer documentation. Its syntax is defined as follows:
$$attStmtType //= ( fmt: "android-key", attStmt: androidStmtFormat ) androidStmtFormat = { alg: COSEAlgorithmIdentifier, sig: bytes, x5c: [ credCert: bytes, * (caCert: bytes) ] }
- Signing procedure
-
Let authenticatorData denote the authenticator data for the attestation, and let clientDataHash denote the hash of the serialized client data.
Request an Android Key Attestation by calling
keyStore.getCertificateChain(myKeyUUID)
providing clientDataHash as the challenge value (e.g., by using setAttestationChallenge). Set x5c to the returned value.The authenticator produces sig by concatenating authenticatorData and clientDataHash, and signing the result using the credential private key. It sets alg to the algorithm of the signature format.
- Verification procedure
-
Given the verification procedure inputs attStmt, authenticatorData and clientDataHash, the verification procedure is as follows:
-
Verify that attStmt is valid CBOR conforming to the syntax defined above and perform CBOR decoding on it to extract the contained fields.
-
Verify that sig is a valid signature over the concatenation of authenticatorData and clientDataHash using the public key in the first certificate in x5c with the algorithm specified in alg.
-
Verify that the public key in the first certificate in x5c matches the
credentialPublicKey
in theattestedCredentialData
in authenticatorData. -
Verify that the
attestationChallenge
field in the attestation certificate extension data is identical to clientDataHash. -
Verify the following using the appropriate authorization list from the attestation certificate extension data:
-
The
AuthorizationList.allApplications
field is not present on either authorization list (softwareEnforced
norteeEnforced
), since PublicKeyCredential MUST be scoped to the RP ID. -
For the following, use only the
teeEnforced
authorization list if the RP wants to accept only keys from a trusted execution environment, otherwise use the union ofteeEnforced
andsoftwareEnforced
.-
The value in the
AuthorizationList.origin
field is equal toKM_ORIGIN_GENERATED
. -
The value in the
AuthorizationList.purpose
field is equal toKM_PURPOSE_SIGN
.
-
-
-
If successful, return implementation-specific values representing attestation type Basic and attestation trust path x5c.
-
8.4.1. Android Key Attestation Statement Certificate Requirements
Android Key Attestation attestation certificate's android key attestation certificate extension data is identified by the OID "1.3.6.1.4.1.11129.2.1.17", and its schema is defined in the Android developer documentation.
8.5. Android SafetyNet Attestation Statement Format
When the authenticator is a platform authenticator on certain Android platforms, the attestation statement may be based on the SafetyNet API. In this case the authenticator data is completely controlled by the caller of the SafetyNet API (typically an application running on the Android platform) and the attestation statement provides some statements about the health of the platform and the identity of the calling application (see SafetyNet Documentation for more details).
- Attestation statement format identifier
-
android-safetynet
- Attestation types supported
- Syntax
-
The syntax of an Android Attestation statement is defined as follows:
$$attStmtType //= ( fmt: "android-safetynet", attStmt: safetynetStmtFormat ) safetynetStmtFormat = { ver: text, response: bytes }
The semantics of the above fields are as follows:
- ver
-
The version number of Google Play Services responsible for providing the SafetyNet API.
- response
-
The UTF-8 encoded result of the getJwsResult() call of the SafetyNet API. This value is a JWS [RFC7515] object (see SafetyNet online documentation) in Compact Serialization.
- Signing procedure
-
Let authenticatorData denote the authenticator data for the attestation, and let clientDataHash denote the hash of the serialized client data.
Concatenate authenticatorData and clientDataHash, perform SHA-256 hash of the concatenated string, and let the result of the hash form attToBeSigned.
Request a SafetyNet attestation, providing attToBeSigned as the nonce value. Set response to the result, and ver to the version of Google Play Services running in the authenticator.
- Verification procedure
-
Given the verification procedure inputs attStmt, authenticatorData and clientDataHash, the verification procedure is as follows:
-
Verify that attStmt is valid CBOR conforming to the syntax defined above and perform CBOR decoding on it to extract the contained fields.
-
Verify that response is a valid SafetyNet response of version ver by following the steps indicated by the SafetyNet online documentation. As of this writing, there is only one format of the SafetyNet response and ver is reserved for future use.
-
Verify that the
nonce
attribute in the payload of response is identical to the Base64 encoding of the SHA-256 hash of the concatenation of authenticatorData and clientDataHash. -
Verify that the SafetyNet response actually came from the SafetyNet service by following the steps in the SafetyNet online documentation.
-
If successful, return implementation-specific values representing attestation type Basic and attestation trust path x5c.
-
8.6. FIDO U2F Attestation Statement Format
This attestation statement format is used with FIDO U2F authenticators using the formats defined in [FIDO-U2F-Message-Formats].
- Attestation statement format identifier
-
fido-u2f
- Attestation types supported
- Syntax
-
The syntax of a FIDO U2F attestation statement is defined as follows:
$$attStmtType //= ( fmt: "fido-u2f", attStmt: u2fStmtFormat ) u2fStmtFormat = { x5c: [ attestnCert: bytes ], sig: bytes }
The semantics of the above fields are as follows:
- x5c
-
A single element array containing the attestation certificate in X.509 format.
- sig
-
The attestation signature. The signature was calculated over the (raw) U2F registration response message [FIDO-U2F-Message-Formats] received by the client from the authenticator.
- Signing procedure
-
If the credential public key of the attested credential is not of algorithm -7 ("ES256"), stop and return an error. Otherwise, let authenticatorData denote the authenticator data for the attestation, and let clientDataHash denote the hash of the serialized client data. (Since SHA-256 is used to hash the serialized client data, clientDataHash will be 32 bytes long.)
Generate a Registration Response Message as specified in [FIDO-U2F-Message-Formats] Section 4.3, with the application parameter set to the SHA-256 hash of the RP ID that the given credential is scoped to, the challenge parameter set to clientDataHash, and the key handle parameter set to the credential ID of the given credential. Set the raw signature part of this Registration Response Message (i.e., without the user public key, key handle, and attestation certificates) as sig and set the attestation certificates of the attestation public key as x5c.
- Verification procedure
-
Given the verification procedure inputs attStmt, authenticatorData and clientDataHash, the verification procedure is as follows:
-
Verify that attStmt is valid CBOR conforming to the syntax defined above and perform CBOR decoding on it to extract the contained fields.
-
Check that x5c has exactly one element and let attCert be that element. Let certificate public key be the public key conveyed by attCert. If certificate public key is not an Elliptic Curve (EC) public key over the P-256 curve, terminate this algorithm and return an appropriate error.
-
Extract the claimed rpIdHash from authenticatorData, and the claimed credentialId and credentialPublicKey from authenticatorData.
attestedCredentialData
. -
Convert the COSE_KEY formatted credentialPublicKey (see Section 7 of [RFC8152]) to Raw ANSI X9.62 public key format (see ALG_KEY_ECC_X962_RAW in Section 3.6.2 Public Key Representation Formats of [FIDO-Registry]).
-
Let x be the value corresponding to the "-2" key (representing x coordinate) in credentialPublicKey, and confirm its size to be of 32 bytes. If size differs or "-2" key is not found, terminate this algorithm and return an appropriate error.
-
Let y be the value corresponding to the "-3" key (representing y coordinate) in credentialPublicKey, and confirm its size to be of 32 bytes. If size differs or "-3" key is not found, terminate this algorithm and return an appropriate error.
-
Let publicKeyU2F be the concatenation
0x04 || x || y
.Note: This signifies uncompressed ECC key format.
-
-
Let verificationData be the concatenation of (0x00 || rpIdHash || clientDataHash || credentialId || publicKeyU2F) (see Section 4.3 of [FIDO-U2F-Message-Formats]).
-
Verify the sig using verificationData and the certificate public key per section 4.1.4 of [SEC1] with SHA-256 as the hash function used in step two.
-
Optionally, inspect x5c and consult externally provided knowledge to determine whether attStmt conveys a Basic or AttCA attestation.
-
If successful, return implementation-specific values representing attestation type Basic, AttCA or uncertainty, and attestation trust path x5c.
-
8.7. None Attestation Statement Format
The none attestation statement format is used to replace any authenticator-provided attestation statement when a WebAuthn Relying Party indicates it does not wish to receive attestation information, see § 5.4.7 Attestation Conveyance Preference Enumeration (enum AttestationConveyancePreference).
The authenticator MAY also directly generate attestation statements of this format if the authenticator does not support attestation.
- Attestation statement format identifier
-
none
- Attestation types supported
- Syntax
-
The syntax of a none attestation statement is defined as follows:
$$attStmtType //= ( fmt: "none", attStmt: emptyMap ) emptyMap = {}
- Signing procedure
-
Return the fixed attestation statement defined above.
- Verification procedure
-
Return implementation-specific values representing attestation type None and an empty attestation trust path.
9. WebAuthn Extensions
The mechanism for generating public key credentials, as well as requesting and generating Authentication assertions, as defined in § 5 Web Authentication API, can be extended to suit particular use cases. Each case is addressed by defining a registration extension and/or an authentication extension.
Every extension is a client extension, meaning that the extension involves communication with and processing by the client. Client extensions define the following steps and data:
-
navigator.credentials.create()
extension request parameters and response values for registration extensions. -
navigator.credentials.get()
extension request parameters and response values for authentication extensions. -
Client extension processing for registration extensions and authentication extensions.
When creating a public key credential or requesting an authentication assertion, a WebAuthn Relying Party can request the use of a set
of extensions. These extensions will be invoked during the requested operation if they are supported by the client and/or the WebAuthn Authenticator. The Relying Party sends the client extension input for each extension in the get()
call
(for authentication extensions) or create()
call (for registration extensions) to the client.
The client performs client extension processing for each extension that the client platform supports, and augments the client data as specified by each extension, by including the extension identifier and client extension output values.
An extension can also be an authenticator extension, meaning that the extension involves communication with and processing by the authenticator. Authenticator extensions define the following steps and data:
-
authenticatorMakeCredential extension request parameters and response values for registration extensions.
-
authenticatorGetAssertion extension request parameters and response values for authentication extensions.
-
Authenticator extension processing for registration extensions and authentication extensions.
For authenticator extensions, as part of the client extension processing, the client also creates the CBOR authenticator extension input value for each extension (often based on the corresponding client extension input value),
and passes them to the authenticator in the create()
call (for registration extensions) or the get()
call (for authentication extensions). These authenticator extension input values are
represented in CBOR and passed as name-value pairs, with the extension identifier as the name, and the corresponding authenticator extension input as the value. The authenticator, in turn, performs additional processing for the extensions
that it supports, and returns the CBOR authenticator extension output for each as specified by the extension. Part of
the client extension processing for authenticator extensions is to use the authenticator extension output as an
input to creating the client extension output.
All WebAuthn Extensions are OPTIONAL for both clients and authenticators. Thus, any extensions requested by a Relying Party MAY be ignored by the client browser or OS and not passed to the authenticator at all, or they MAY be ignored by the authenticator. Ignoring an extension is never considered a failure in WebAuthn API processing, so when Relying Parties include extensions with any API calls, they MUST be prepared to handle cases where some or all of those extensions are ignored.
Clients wishing to support the widest possible range of extensions MAY choose to pass through any extensions that they do not recognize to authenticators, generating the authenticator extension input by simply encoding the client extension input in CBOR. All WebAuthn Extensions MUST be defined in such a way that this implementation choice does not endanger the user’s security or privacy. For instance, if an extension requires client processing, it could be defined in a manner that ensures such a naïve pass-through will produce a semantically invalid authenticator extension input value, resulting in the extension being ignored by the authenticator. Since all extensions are OPTIONAL, this will not cause a functional failure in the API operation. Likewise, clients can choose to produce a client extension output value for an extension that it does not understand by encoding the authenticator extension output value into JSON, provided that the CBOR output uses only types present in JSON.
When clients choose to pass through extensions they do not recognize, the JavaScript values in the client extension inputs are converted to CBOR values in the authenticator extension inputs. When the JavaScript value is an %ArrayBuffer%, it is converted to a CBOR byte array. When the JavaScript value is a non-integer number, it is converted to a 64-bit CBOR floating point number. Otherwise, when the JavaScript type corresponds to a JSON type, the conversion is done using the rules defined in Section 4.2 of [RFC7049] (Converting from JSON to CBOR), but operating on inputs of JavaScript type values rather than inputs of JSON type values. Once these conversions are done, canonicalization of the resulting CBOR MUST be performed using the CTAP2 canonical CBOR encoding form.
Note that the JavaScript numeric conversion rules have the consequence that when a client passes through an extension it does not recognize, if the extension uses floating point values, authenticators need to be prepared to receive those values as CBOR integers, should the authenticator want the extension to always work without actual client support for it. This will happen when the floating point values used happen to be integers.
Likewise, when clients receive outputs from extensions they have passed through that they do not recognize, the CBOR values in the authenticator extension outputs are converted to JavaScript values in the client extension outputs. When the CBOR value is a byte string, it is converted to a JavaScript %ArrayBuffer% (rather than a base64url-encoded string). Otherwise, when the CBOR type corresponds to a JSON type, the conversion is done using the rules defined in Section 4.1 of [RFC7049] (Converting from CBOR to JSON), but producing outputs of JavaScript type values rather than outputs of JSON type values.
Note that some clients may choose to implement this pass-through capability under a feature flag. Supporting this capability can facilitate innovation, allowing authenticators to experiment with new extensions and Relying Parties to use them before there is explicit support for them in clients.
The IANA "WebAuthn Extension Identifier" registry established by [WebAuthn-Registries] can be consulted for an up-to-date list of registered WebAuthn Extensions.
9.1. Extension Identifiers
Extensions are identified by a string, called an extension identifier, chosen by the extension author.
Extension identifiers SHOULD be registered per [WebAuthn-Registries] "Registries for Web Authentication (WebAuthn)". All registered extension identifiers are unique amongst themselves as a matter of course.
Unregistered extension identifiers SHOULD aim to be globally unique, e.g., by including the defining entity such as myCompany_extension
.
All extension identifiers MUST be a maximum of 32 octets in length and MUST consist only of printable USASCII characters, excluding backslash and doublequote, i.e., VCHAR as defined in [RFC5234] but without %x22 and %x5c. Implementations MUST match WebAuthn extension identifiers in a case-sensitive fashion.
Extensions that may exist in multiple versions should take care to include a version in their identifier. In effect, different
versions are thus treated as different extensions, e.g., myCompany_extension_01
§ 10 Defined Extensions defines an initial set of extensions and their identifiers. See the IANA "WebAuthn Extension Identifier" registry established by [WebAuthn-Registries] for an up-to-date list of registered WebAuthn Extension Identifiers.
9.2. Defining Extensions
A definition of an extension MUST specify an extension identifier, a client extension input argument
to be sent via the get()
or create()
call,
the client extension processing rules, and a client extension output value.
If the extension communicates with the authenticator (meaning it is an authenticator extension),
it MUST also specify the CBOR authenticator extension input argument
sent via the authenticatorGetAssertion or authenticatorMakeCredential call,
the authenticator extension processing rules, and the CBOR authenticator extension output value.
Any client extension that is processed by the client MUST return a client extension output value so that the WebAuthn Relying Party knows that the extension was honored by the client. Similarly, any extension that requires authenticator processing MUST return
an authenticator extension output to let the Relying Party know that the extension was honored by the authenticator. If an
extension does not otherwise require any result values, it SHOULD be defined as returning a JSON Boolean client extension
output result, set to true
to signify that the extension was understood and processed. Likewise, any authenticator
extension that does not otherwise require any result values MUST return a value and SHOULD return a CBOR Boolean authenticator extension output result, set to true
to signify that the extension was understood and processed.
9.3. Extending Request Parameters
An extension defines one or two request arguments. The client extension input,
which is a value that can be encoded in JSON, is passed from the WebAuthn Relying Party to the client
in the get()
or create()
call,
while the CBOR authenticator extension input is
passed from the client to the authenticator for authenticator extensions during the processing of these calls.
A Relying Party simultaneously requests the use of an extension and sets its client extension input by including an entry in the extensions
option to the create()
or get()
call.
The entry key is the extension identifier and the value is the client extension input.
var assertionPromise= navigator. credentials. get({ publicKey: { // The challenge is produced by the server; see the Security Considerations challenge: new Uint8Array([ 4 , 99 , 22 /* 29 more random bytes generated by the server */ ]), extensions: { "webauthnExample_foobar" : 42 } } });
Extension definitions MUST specify the valid values for their client extension input. Clients SHOULD ignore extensions with
an invalid client extension input. If an extension does not require any parameters from the Relying Party, it SHOULD be defined
as taking a Boolean client argument, set to true
to signify that the extension is requested by the Relying Party.
Extensions that only affect client processing need not specify authenticator extension input. Extensions that have
authenticator processing MUST specify the method of computing the authenticator extension input from the client extension
input. For extensions that do not require input parameters and are defined as taking a Boolean client extension input value set to true
, this method SHOULD consist of passing an authenticator extension input value of true
(CBOR major type
7, value 21).
Note: Extensions should aim to define authenticator arguments that are as small as possible. Some authenticators communicate over low-bandwidth links such as Bluetooth Low-Energy or NFC.
9.4. Client Extension Processing
Extensions MAY define additional processing requirements on the client during the creation of credentials or the generation of an assertion. The client extension input for the extension is used as an input to this client processing. For each supported client extension, the client adds an entry to the clientExtensions map with the extension identifier as the key, and the extension’s client extension input as the value.
Likewise, the client extension outputs are represented as a dictionary in the result of getClientExtensionResults()
with extension identifiers as keys, and the client extension output value of each extension as the value.
Like the client extension input, the client extension output is a value that can be encoded in JSON.
There MUST NOT be any values returned for ignored extensions.
Extensions that require authenticator processing MUST define the process by which the client extension input can be used to determine the CBOR authenticator extension input and the process by which the CBOR authenticator extension output can be used to determine the client extension output.
9.5. Authenticator Extension Processing
The CBOR authenticator extension input value of each processed authenticator extension is included in the extensions parameter of the authenticatorMakeCredential and authenticatorGetAssertion operations. The extensions parameter is a CBOR map where each key is an extension identifier and the corresponding value is the authenticator extension input for that extension.
Likewise, the extension output is represented in the extensions part of the authenticator data. The extensions part of the authenticator data is a CBOR map where each key is an extension identifier and the corresponding value is the authenticator extension output for that extension.
For each supported extension, the authenticator extension processing rule for that extension is used create the authenticator extension output from the authenticator extension input and possibly also other inputs. There MUST NOT be any values returned for ignored extensions.
10. Defined Extensions
This section defines the initial set of extensions to be registered in the IANA "WebAuthn Extension Identifier" registry established by [WebAuthn-Registries]. These MAY be implemented by user agents targeting broad interoperability.
10.1. FIDO AppID Extension (appid)
This extension allows WebAuthn Relying Parties that have previously registered a credential using the legacy FIDO U2F JavaScript API [FIDOU2FJavaScriptAPI] to request an assertion. The FIDO APIs use an alternative identifier for Relying Parties called an AppID [FIDO-APPID], and any credentials created using those APIs will be scoped to that identifier. Without this extension, they would need to be re-registered in order to be scoped to an RP ID.
In addition to setting the appid
extension input,
using this extension requires some additional processing by the Relying Party in order to allow users to authenticate using their registered U2F credentials:
-
List the desired U2F credentials in the
allowCredentials
option of theget()
method:-
Set the
type
members topublic-key
. -
Set the
id
members to the respective U2F key handles of the desired credentials. Note that U2F key handles commonly use base64url encoding but must be decoded to their binary form when used inid
.
allowCredentials
MAY contain a mixture of both WebAuthn credential IDs and U2F key handles; stating theappid
via this extension does not prevent the user from using a WebAuthn-registered credential scoped to the RP ID stated inrpId
. -
-
When verifying the assertion, expect that the
rpIdHash
MAY be the hash of the AppID instead of the RP ID.
This extension does not allow FIDO-compatible credentials to be created. Thus, credentials created with WebAuthn are not backwards compatible with the FIDO JavaScript APIs.
Note: appid
should be set to the AppID
that the Relying Party previously used in the legacy FIDO APIs.
This might not be the same as the result of translating the Relying Party's WebAuthn RP ID to the AppID format,
e.g., the previously used AppID may have been "https://accounts.example.com"
but the currently used RP ID might be "example.com".
- Extension identifier
-
appid
- Operation applicability
- Client extension input
-
A single USVString specifying a FIDO AppID.
partial dictionary AuthenticationExtensionsClientInputs {USVString
; };appid - Client extension processing
-
-
Let facetId be the result of passing the caller’s origin to the FIDO algorithm for determining the FacetID of a calling application.
-
Let appId be the extension input.
-
Pass facetId and appId to the FIDO algorithm for determining if a caller’s FacetID is authorized for an AppID. If that algorithm rejects appId then return a "
SecurityError
"DOMException
. -
When building allowCredentialDescriptorList, if a U2F authenticator indicates that a credential is inapplicable (i.e. by returning
SW_WRONG_DATA
) then the client MUST retry with the U2F application parameter set to the SHA-256 hash of appId. If this results in an applicable credential, the client MUST include the credential in allowCredentialDescriptorList. The value of appId then replaces therpId
parameter of authenticatorGetAssertion. -
Let output be the Boolean value
false
. -
When creating assertionCreationData, if the assertion was created by a U2F authenticator with the U2F application parameter set to the SHA-256 hash of appId instead of the SHA-256 hash of the RP ID, set output to
true
.
-
Note: In practice, several implementations do not implement steps four and onward of the algorithm for determining if a caller’s FacetID is authorized for an AppID. Instead, in step three, the comparison on the host is relaxed to accept hosts on the same site.
- Client extension output
-
Returns the value of output. If true, the AppID was used and thus, when verifying the assertion, the Relying Party MUST expect the
rpIdHash
to be the hash of the AppID, not the RP ID.partial dictionary AuthenticationExtensionsClientOutputs {boolean
; };appid - Authenticator extension input
-
None.
- Authenticator extension processing
-
None.
- Authenticator extension output
-
None.
10.2. FIDO AppID Exclusion Extension (appidExclude)
This registration extension allows WebAuthn Relying Parties to exclude authenticators which contain specified credentials that were created with the legacy FIDO U2F JavaScript API [FIDOU2FJavaScriptAPI].
During a transition from the FIDO U2F JavaScript API, a Relying Party may have a population of users with legacy credentials already registered. The appid extension allows the sign-in flow to be transitioned smoothly but, when transitioning the registration flow, the excludeCredentials field will not be effective in excluding authenticators with legacy credentials because its contents are taken to be WebAuthn credentials. This extension directs client platforms to consider the contents of excludeCredentials as both WebAuthn and legacy FIDO credentials. Note that U2F key handles commonly use base64url encoding but must be decoded to their binary form when used in excludeCredentials.
- Extension identifier
-
appidExclude
- Operation applicability
- Client extension input
-
A single USVString specifying a FIDO AppID.
partial dictionary AuthenticationExtensionsClientInputs {USVString
; };appidExclude - Client extension processing
-
When creating a new credential:
-
Just after establishing the RP ID perform these steps:
-
Let facetId be the result of passing the caller’s origin to the FIDO algorithm for determining the FacetID of a calling application.
-
Let appId be the value of the extension input
appidExclude
. -
Pass facetId and appId to the FIDO algorithm for determining if a caller’s FacetID is authorized for an AppID. If the latter algorithm rejects appId then return a "
SecurityError
"DOMException
and terminate the creating a new credential algorithm as well as these steps.Note: In practice, several implementations do not implement steps four and onward of the algorithm for determining if a caller’s FacetID is authorized for an AppID. Instead, in step three, the comparison on the host is relaxed to accept hosts on the same site.
-
Otherwise, continue with normal processing.
-
-
Just prior to invoking authenticatorMakeCredential perform these steps:
-
If authenticator supports the U2F protocol [FIDO-U2F-Message-Formats], then for each credential descriptor C in excludeCredentialDescriptorList:
-
Check whether C was created using U2F on authenticator by sending a
U2F_AUTHENTICATE
message to authenticator whose "five parts" are set to the following values:- control byte
-
0x07
("check-only") - challenge parameter
-
32 random bytes
- application parameter
-
SHA-256 hash of appId
- key handle length
-
The length of
C.
(in bytes)id
- key handle
-
The value of
C.
, i.e., the credential id.id
-
If authenticator responds with
message:error:test-of-user-presence-required
(i.e., success): cease normal processing of this authenticator and indicate in a platform-specific manner that the authenticator is inapplicable. For example, this could be in the form of UI, or could involve requesting user consent from authenticator and, upon receipt, treating it as if the authenticator had returnedInvalidStateError
. Requesting user consent can be accomplished by sending anotherU2F_AUTHENTICATE
message to authenticator as above except for setting control byte to0x03
("enforce-user-presence-and-sign"), and ignoring the response.
-
-
Continue with normal processing.
-
-
- Client extension output
-
None.
- Authenticator extension input
-
None.
- Authenticator extension processing
-
None.
- Authenticator extension output
-
None.
10.3. Simple Transaction Authorization Extension (txAuthSimple)
This extension allows for a simple form of transaction authorization. A Relying Party can specify a prompt string, intended for display on a trusted device on the authenticator.
- Extension identifier
-
txAuthSimple
- Operation applicability
- Client extension input
-
A single USVString prompt.
partial dictionary AuthenticationExtensionsClientInputs {USVString
; };txAuthSimple - Client extension processing
-
None, except creating the authenticator extension input from the client extension input.
- Client extension output
-
Returns the authenticator extension output string UTF-8 decoded into a USVString.
partial dictionary AuthenticationExtensionsClientOutputs {USVString
; };txAuthSimple - Authenticator extension input
-
The client extension input encoded as a CBOR text string (major type 3).
CDDL: txAuthSimpleInput = (tstr)
- Authenticator extension processing
-
The authenticator MUST display the prompt to the user before performing either user verification or test of user presence. The authenticator MAY insert line breaks if needed.
- Authenticator extension output
-
A single CBOR string, representing the prompt as displayed (including any eventual line breaks).
CDDL: txAuthSimpleOutput = (tstr)
10.4. Generic Transaction Authorization Extension (txAuthGeneric)
This extension allows images to be used as transaction authorization prompts as well. This allows authenticators without a font rendering engine to be used and also supports a richer visual appearance.
- Extension identifier
-
txAuthGeneric
- Operation applicability
- Client extension input
-
A JavaScript object defined as follows:
dictionary
{txAuthGenericArg required USVString
; // MIME-Type of the content, e.g., "image/png"contentType required ArrayBuffer
; };content partial dictionary AuthenticationExtensionsClientInputs {txAuthGenericArg
; };txAuthGeneric - Client extension processing
-
None, except creating the authenticator extension input from the client extension input.
- Client extension output
-
Returns the authenticator extension output value as an ArrayBuffer.
partial dictionary AuthenticationExtensionsClientOutputs {ArrayBuffer
; };txAuthGeneric - Authenticator extension input
-
The client extension input encoded as a CBOR map.
- Authenticator extension processing
-
The authenticator MUST display the
content
to the user before performing either user verification or test of user presence. The authenticator MAY add other information below thecontent
. No changes are allowed to thecontent
itself, i.e., insidecontent
boundary box. - Authenticator extension output
-
The hash value of the
content
which was displayed. The authenticator MUST use the same hash algorithm as it uses for the signature itself.
10.5. Authenticator Selection Extension (authnSel)
This extension allows a WebAuthn Relying Party to guide the selection of the authenticator that will be leveraged when creating the credential. It is intended primarily for Relying Parties that wish to tightly control the experience around credential creation.
- Extension identifier
-
authnSel
- Operation applicability
- Client extension input
-
A sequence of AAGUIDs:
typedef sequence <AAGUID >
;AuthenticatorSelectionList partial dictionary AuthenticationExtensionsClientInputs {AuthenticatorSelectionList
; };authnSel Each AAGUID corresponds to an authenticator model that is acceptable to the Relying Party for this credential creation. The list is ordered by decreasing preference.
An AAGUID is defined as an array containing the globally unique identifier of the authenticator model being sought.
typedef BufferSource
;AAGUID - Client extension processing
-
If the client supports the Authenticator Selection Extension, it MUST use the first available authenticator whose AAGUID is present in the
AuthenticatorSelectionList
. If none of the available authenticators match a provided AAGUID, the client MUST select an authenticator from among the available authenticators to generate the credential. - Client extension output
-
Returns the value
true
to indicate to the Relying Party that the extension was acted upon.partial dictionary AuthenticationExtensionsClientOutputs {boolean
; };authnSel - Authenticator extension input
-
None.
- Authenticator extension processing
-
None.
- Authenticator extension output
-
None.
10.6. Supported Extensions Extension (exts)
This extension enables the WebAuthn Relying Party to determine which extensions the authenticator supports.
- Extension identifier
-
exts
- Operation applicability
- Client extension input
-
The Boolean value
true
to indicate that this extension is requested by the Relying Party.partial dictionary AuthenticationExtensionsClientInputs {boolean
; };exts - Client extension processing
-
None, except creating the authenticator extension input from the client extension input.
- Client extension output
-
Returns the list of supported extensions as an array of extension identifier strings.
typedef sequence <USVString >
;AuthenticationExtensionsSupported partial dictionary AuthenticationExtensionsClientOutputs {AuthenticationExtensionsSupported
; };exts - Authenticator extension input
-
The Boolean value
true
, encoded in CBOR (major type 7, value 21). - Authenticator extension processing
-
The authenticator sets the authenticator extension output to be a list of extensions that the authenticator supports, as defined below. This extension can be added to attestation objects.
- Authenticator extension output
-
The SupportedExtensions extension is a list (CBOR array) of extension identifier (UTF-8 encoded) strings.
10.7. User Verification Index Extension (uvi)
This extension enables use of a user verification index.
- Extension identifier
-
uvi
- Operation applicability
- Client extension input
-
The Boolean value
true
to indicate that this extension is requested by the Relying Party.partial dictionary AuthenticationExtensionsClientInputs {boolean
; };uvi - Client extension processing
-
None, except creating the authenticator extension input from the client extension input.
- Client extension output
-
Returns the authenticator extension output as an ArrayBuffer.
partial dictionary AuthenticationExtensionsClientOutputs {ArrayBuffer
; };uvi - Authenticator extension input
-
The Boolean value
true
, encoded in CBOR (major type 7, value 21). - Authenticator extension processing
-
The authenticator sets the authenticator extension output to be a user verification index indicating the method used by the user to authorize the operation, as defined below. This extension can be added to attestation objects and assertions.
- Authenticator extension output
-
The user verification index (UVI) is a value uniquely identifying a user verification data record. The UVI is encoded as CBOR byte string (type 0x58). Each UVI value MUST be specific to the related key (in order to provide unlinkability). It also MUST contain sufficient entropy that makes guessing impractical. UVI values MUST NOT be reused by the Authenticator (for other biometric data or users).
The UVI data can be used by servers to understand whether an authentication was authorized by the exact same biometric data as the initial key generation. This allows the detection and prevention of "friendly fraud".
As an example, the UVI could be computed as SHA256(KeyID || SHA256(rawUVI)), where
||
represents concatenation, and the rawUVI reflects (a) the biometric reference data, (b) the related OS level user ID and (c) an identifier which changes whenever a factory reset is performed for the authenticator, e.g. rawUVI = biometricReferenceData || OSLevelUserID || FactoryResetCounter.Example of authenticator data containing one UVI extension
... -- RP ID hash (32 bytes) 81 -- UP and ED set 00 00 00 01 -- (initial) signature counter ... -- all public key alg etc. A1 -- extension: CBOR map of one element 63 -- Key 1: CBOR text string of 3 bytes 75 76 69 -- "uvi" [=UTF-8 encoded=] string 58 20 -- Value 1: CBOR byte string with 0x20 bytes 43 B8 E3 BE 27 95 8C 28 -- the UVI value itself D5 74 BF 46 8A 85 CF 46 9A 14 F0 E5 16 69 31 DA 4B CF FF C1 BB 11 32 82
10.8. Location Extension (loc)
This extension provides the authenticator's current location to the WebAuthn WebAuthn Relying Party.
- Extension identifier
-
loc
- Operation applicability
- Client extension input
-
The Boolean value
true
to indicate that this extension is requested by the Relying Party.partial dictionary AuthenticationExtensionsClientInputs {boolean
; };loc - Client extension processing
-
None, except creating the authenticator extension input from the client extension input.
- Client extension output
-
Returns a JavaScript object that encodes the location information in the authenticator extension output as a
Coordinates
value, as defined by [Geolocation-API].partial dictionary AuthenticationExtensionsClientOutputs {Coordinates
; };loc - Authenticator extension input
-
The Boolean value
true
, encoded in CBOR (major type 7, value 21). - Authenticator extension processing
-
Determine the Geolocation value.
- Authenticator extension output
-
A [Geolocation-API]
Coordinates
record encoded as a CBOR map. Values represented by the "double" type in JavaScript are represented as 64-bit CBOR floating point numbers. Per the Geolocation specification, the "latitude", "longitude", and "accuracy" values are REQUIRED and other values such as "altitude" are OPTIONAL.
10.9. User Verification Method Extension (uvm)
This extension enables use of a user verification method.
- Extension identifier
-
uvm
- Operation applicability
- Client extension input
-
The Boolean value
true
to indicate that this extension is requested by the Relying Party.partial dictionary AuthenticationExtensionsClientInputs {boolean
; };uvm - Client extension processing
-
None, except creating the authenticator extension input from the client extension input.
- Client extension output
-
Returns a JSON array of 3-element arrays of numbers that encodes the factors in the authenticator extension output.
typedef sequence <unsigned long >
;UvmEntry typedef sequence <UvmEntry >
;UvmEntries partial dictionary AuthenticationExtensionsClientOutputs {UvmEntries
; };uvm - Authenticator extension input
-
The Boolean value
true
, encoded in CBOR (major type 7, value 21). - Authenticator extension processing
-
The authenticator sets the authenticator extension output to be one or more user verification methods indicating the method(s) used by the user to authorize the operation, as defined below. This extension can be added to attestation objects and assertions.
- Authenticator extension output
-
Authenticators can report up to 3 different user verification methods (factors) used in a single authentication instance, using the CBOR syntax defined below:
uvmFormat = [ 1*3 uvmEntry ] uvmEntry = [ userVerificationMethod: uint .size 4, keyProtectionType: uint .size 2, matcherProtectionType: uint .size 2 ]
The semantics of the fields in each
uvmEntry
are as follows:- userVerificationMethod
-
The authentication method/factor used by the authenticator to verify the user. Available values are defined in Section 3.1 User Verification Methods of [FIDO-Registry].
- keyProtectionType
-
The method used by the authenticator to protect the FIDO registration private key material. Available values are defined in Section 3.2 Key Protection Types of [FIDO-Registry].
- matcherProtectionType
-
The method used by the authenticator to protect the matcher that performs user verification. Available values are defined in Section 3.3 Matcher Protection Types of [FIDO-Registry].
If >3 factors can be used in an authentication instance the authenticator vendor MUST select the 3 factors it believes will be most relevant to the Server to include in the UVM.
Example for authenticator data containing one UVM extension for a multi-factor authentication instance where 2 factors were used:
... -- RP ID hash (32 bytes) 81 -- UP and ED set 00 00 00 01 -- (initial) signature counter ... -- all public key alg etc. A1 -- extension: CBOR map of one element 63 -- Key 1: CBOR text string of 3 bytes 75 76 6d -- "uvm" [=UTF-8 encoded=] string 82 -- Value 1: CBOR array of length 2 indicating two factor usage 83 -- Item 1: CBOR array of length 3 02 -- Subitem 1: CBOR integer for User Verification Method Fingerprint 04 -- Subitem 2: CBOR short for Key Protection Type TEE 02 -- Subitem 3: CBOR short for Matcher Protection Type TEE 83 -- Item 2: CBOR array of length 3 04 -- Subitem 1: CBOR integer for User Verification Method Passcode 01 -- Subitem 2: CBOR short for Key Protection Type Software 01 -- Subitem 3: CBOR short for Matcher Protection Type Software
10.10. Biometric Authenticator Performance Bounds Extension (biometricPerfBounds)
This extension allows WebAuthn Relying Parties to specify the desired performance bounds for selecting biometric authenticators as candidates to be employed in a registration ceremony.
- Extension identifier
-
biometricPerfBounds
- Operation applicability
- Client extension input
-
Biometric performance bounds:
dictionary
{authenticatorBiometricPerfBounds float
;FAR float
; };FRR The FAR is the maximum false acceptance rate for a biometric authenticator allowed by the Relying Party.
The FRR is the maximum false rejection rate for a biometric authenticator allowed by the Relying Party.
- Client extension processing
-
If the client supports this extension, it MUST NOT use a biometric authenticator whose FAR or FRR does not match the bounds as provided. The client can obtain information about the biometric authenticator’s performance from authoritative sources such as the FIDO Metadata Service [FIDOMetadataService] (see Sec. 3.2 of [FIDOUAFAuthenticatorMetadataStatements]).
- Client extension output
-
Returns the JSON value
true
to indicate to the Relying Party that the extension was acted upon - Authenticator extension input
-
None.
- Authenticator extension processing
-
None.
- Authenticator extension output
-
None.
10.11. Credential Properties Extension (credProps)
This client registration extension facilitates reporting certain credential properties known by the client to the requesting WebAuthn Relying Party upon creation of a public key credential source as a result of a registration ceremony.
At this time, one credential property is defined: the resident key credential property.
- Extension identifier
-
credProps
- Operation applicability
- Client extension input
-
The Boolean value
true
to indicate that this extension is requested by the Relying Party.partial dictionary AuthenticationExtensionsClientInputs {boolean
; };credProps - Client extension processing
-
None, other than to report on credential properties in the output.
- Client extension output
-
Set
clientExtensionResults["
to the value of the requireResidentKey parameter that was used in the invocation of the authenticatorMakeCredential operation.credProps
"]["rk"]dictionary
{CredentialPropertiesOutput boolean rk ; };partial dictionary AuthenticationExtensionsClientOutputs {CredentialPropertiesOutput
; };credProps rk
, of type boolean-
This OPTIONAL property, known abstractly as the resident key credential property, is a Boolean value indicating whether the
PublicKeyCredential
returned as a result of a registration ceremony is a resident credential. Ifrk
istrue
, the credential is a resident credential; ifrk
isfalse
, the credential is a non-resident credential. Ifrk
is not present, it is not known whether the credential is a resident credential or a non-resident credential.
- Authenticator extension input
-
None.
- Authenticator extension processing
-
None.
- Authenticator extension output
-
None.
11. User Agent Automation
For the purposes of user agent automation and web application testing, this document defines a number of [WebDriver] extension commands.
11.1. Virtual Authenticators
These WebDriver extension commands create and interact with Virtual Authenticators: software implementations of the Authenticator Model. Virtual Authenticators are stored in a Virtual Authenticator Database. Each stored virtual authenticator has the following properties:
- authenticatorId
-
An non-null string made using up to 48 characters from the
unreserved
production defined in Appendix A of [RFC3986] that uniquely identifies the Virtual Authenticator. - protocol
-
The protocol the Virtual Authenticator speaks: either
ctap2
orctap1/u2f
[FIDO-CTAP]. - transport
-
The
AuthenticatorTransport
simulated. If the transport is set tointernal
, the authenticator simulates platform attachment. Otherwise, it simulates cross-platform attachment. - hasResidentKey
-
If set to
true
the authenticator will support resident credentials. - hasUserVerification
-
If set to
true
, the authenticator supports user verification. - isUserConsenting
-
Determines the result of all user consent authorization gestures, and by extension, any test of user presence performed on the Virtual Authenticator. If set to
true
, a user consent will always be granted. If set tofalse
, it will not be granted. - isUserVerified
-
Determines the result of User Verification performed on the Virtual Authenticator. If set to
true
, User Verification will always succeed. If set tofalse
, it will fail.Note: This property has no effect if hasUserVerification is set to
false
.
11.2. Add Virtual Authenticator
The Add Virtual Authenticator WebDriver extension command creates a software Virtual Authenticator. It is defined as follows:
HTTP Method | URI Template |
---|---|
POST | /session/{session id}/webauthn/authenticator
|
The Authenticator Configuration is a JSON Object passed to the remote end steps as parameters. It contains the following key and value pairs:
Key | Value Type | Valid Values | Default |
---|---|---|---|
protocol | string | "ctap1/u2f" , "ctap2"
| None |
transport | string | AuthenticatorTransport values
| None |
hasResidentKey | boolean | true , false
| false
|
hasUserVerification | boolean | true , false
| false
|
isUserConsenting | boolean | true , false
| true
|
isUserVerified | boolean | true , false
| false
|
The remote end steps are:
-
If parameters is not a JSON Object, return a WebDriver error with WebDriver error code invalid argument.
Note: parameters is a Authenticator Configuration object.
-
Let authenticator be a new Virtual Authenticator.
-
For each enumerable own property in parameters:
-
Let key be the name of the property.
-
Let value be the result of getting a property named key from parameters.
-
If there is no matching
key
for key in parameters, return a WebDriver error with WebDriver error code invalid argument. -
If value is not one of the
valid values
for that key, return a WebDriver error with WebDriver error code invalid argument. -
Set a property key to value on authenticator.
-
-
For each property in Authenticator Configuration with a default defined:
-
If
key
is not a defined property of authenticator, set a propertykey
todefault
on authenticator.
-
-
For each property in Authenticator Configuration:
-
If
key
is not a defined property of authenticator, return a WebDriver error with WebDriver error code invalid argument.
-
-
Generate a valid unique authenticatorId.
-
Set a property
authenticatorId
to authenticatorId on authenticator. -
Store authenticator in the Virtual Authenticator Database.
-
Return success with data authenticatorId.
11.3. Remove Virtual Authenticator
The Remove Virtual Authenticator WebDriver extension command removes a previously created Virtual Authenticator. It is defined as follows:
HTTP Method | URI Template |
---|---|
DELETE | /session/{session id}/webauthn/authenticator/{authenticatorId}
|
The remote end steps are:
-
If authenticatorId does not match any Virtual Authenticator stored in the Virtual Authenticator Database, return a WebDriver error with WebDriver error code invalid argument.
-
Remove the Virtual Authenticator identified by authenticatorId from the Virtual Authenticator Database
-
Return success.
11.4. Add Credential
The Add Credential WebDriver extension command injects a Public Key Credential Source into an existing Virtual Authenticator. It is defined as follows:
HTTP Method | URI Template |
---|---|
POST | /session/{session id}/webauthn/authenticator/{authenticatorId}/credential
|
The Credential Parameters is a JSON Object passed to the remote end steps as parameters. It contains the following key and value pairs:
Key | Description | Value Type |
---|---|---|
credentialId | The Credential ID encoded using Base64url Encoding. | string |
isResidentCredential | If set to true , a resident credential is created. If set to false , a non-resident credential is created instead.
| boolean |
rpId | The Relying Party ID the credential is scoped to. | string |
privateKey | An asymmetric key package containing a single private key per [RFC5958], encoded using Base64url Encoding. | string |
userHandle | The userHandle associated to the credential encoded using Base64url Encoding. This property may not be defined. | string |
signCount | The initial value for a signature counter associated to the public key credential source. | number |
The remote end steps are:
-
If parameters is not a JSON Object, return a WebDriver error with WebDriver error code invalid argument.
Note: parameters is a Credential Parameters object.
-
Let credentialId be the result of decoding Base64url Encoding on the parameters’ credentialId property.
-
If credentialId is failure, return a WebDriver error with WebDriver error code invalid argument.
-
Let isResidentCredential be the parameters’ isResidentCredential property.
-
If isResidentCredential is not defined, return a WebDriver error with WebDriver error code invalid argument.
-
Let rpId be the parameters’ rpId property.
-
If rpId is not a valid RP ID, return a WebDriver error with WebDriver error code invalid argument.
-
Let privateKey be the result of decoding Base64url Encoding on the parameters’ privateKey property.
-
If privateKey is failure, return a WebDriver error with WebDriver error code invalid argument.
-
If privateKey is not a validly-encoded asymmetric key package containing a single ECDSA private key on the P-256 curve per [RFC5958], return a WebDriver error with WebDriver error code invalid argument.
-
If the parameters’ userHandle property is defined:
-
Let userHandle be the result of decoding Base64url Encoding on the parameters’ userHandle property.
-
If userHandle is failure, return a WebDriver error with WebDriver error code invalid argument.
-
-
Otherwise:
-
If isResidentCredential is
true
, return a WebDriver error with WebDriver error code invalid argument. -
Let userHandle be
null
.
-
-
If authenticatorId does not match any Virtual Authenticator stored in the Virtual Authenticator Database, return a WebDriver error with WebDriver error code invalid argument.
-
Let authenticator be the Virtual Authenticator matched by authenticatorId.
-
If isResidentCredential is
true
and the authenticator’s hasResidentKey property isfalse
, return a WebDriver error with WebDriver error code invalid argument. -
Let credential be a new Client-side-resident Public Key Credential Source if isResidentCredential is
true
or a Server-side-resident Public Key Credential Source otherwise whose items are:- type
- id
-
credentialId
- privateKey
-
privateKey
- rpId
-
rpId
- userHandle
-
userHandle
-
Associate a signature counter counter to the credential with a starting value equal to the parameters’ signCount or
0
if signCount isnull
. -
Store the credential and counter in the database of the authenticator.
-
Return success.
11.5. Get Credentials
The Get Credentials WebDriver extension command returns one Credential Parameters object for every Public Key Credential Source stored in a Virtual Authenticator, regardless of whether they were
stored using Add Credential or navigator.credentials.create()
. It is defined as follows:
HTTP Method | URI Template |
---|---|
GET | /session/{session id}/webauthn/authenticator/{authenticatorId}/credentials
|
The remote end steps are:
-
If authenticatorId does not match any Virtual Authenticator stored in the Virtual Authenticator Database, return a WebDriver error with WebDriver error code invalid argument.
-
Let credentialsArray be an empty array.
-
For each Public Key Credential Source credential, managed by the authenticator identified by authenticatorId, construct a corresponding Credential Parameters Object and add it to credentialsArray.
-
Return success with data containing credentialsArray.
11.6. Remove Credential
The Remove Credential WebDriver extension command removes a Public Key Credential Source stored on a Virtual Authenticator. It is defined as follows:
HTTP Method | URI Template |
---|---|
DELETE | /session/{session id}/webauthn/authenticator/{authenticatorId}/credentials/{credentialId}
|
The remote end steps are:
-
If authenticatorId does not match any Virtual Authenticator stored in the Virtual Authenticator Database, return a WebDriver error with WebDriver error code invalid argument.
-
Let authenticator be the Virtual Authenticator identified by authenticatorId.
-
If credentialId does not match any Public Key Credential Source managed by authenticator, return a WebDriver error with WebDriver error code invalid argument.
-
Remove the Public Key Credential Source identified by credentialId managed by authenticator.
-
Return success.
11.7. Remove All Credentials
The Remove All Credentials WebDriver extension command removes all Public Key Credential Sources stored on a Virtual Authenticator. It is defined as follows:
HTTP Method | URI Template |
---|---|
DELETE | /session/{session id}/webauthn/authenticator/{authenticatorId}/credentials
|
The remote end steps are:
-
If authenticatorId does not match any Virtual Authenticator stored in the Virtual Authenticator Database, return a WebDriver error with WebDriver error code invalid argument.
-
Remove all Public Key Credential Sources managed by the Virtual Authenticator identified by authenticatorId.
-
Return success.
11.8. Set User Verified
The Set User Verified extension command sets the isUserVerified property on the Virtual Authenticator. It is defined as follows:
HTTP Method | URI Template |
---|---|
POST | /session/{session id}/webauthn/authenticator/{authenticatorId}/uv
|
The remote end steps are:
-
If parameters is not a JSON Object, return a WebDriver error with WebDriver error code invalid argument.
-
If authenticatorId does not match any Virtual Authenticator stored in the Virtual Authenticator Database, return a WebDriver error with WebDriver error code invalid argument.
-
If isUserVerified is not a defined property of parameters, return a WebDriver error with WebDriver error code invalid argument.
-
Let authenticator be the Virtual Authenticator identified by authenticatorId.
-
Set the authenticator’s isUserVerified property to the parameters’ isUserVerified property.
-
Return success.
12. IANA Considerations
12.1. WebAuthn Attestation Statement Format Identifier Registrations
This section registers the attestation statement formats defined in Section § 8 Defined Attestation Statement Formats in the IANA "WebAuthn Attestation Statement Format Identifier" registry established by [WebAuthn-Registries].
-
WebAuthn Attestation Statement Format Identifier: packed
-
Description: The "packed" attestation statement format is a WebAuthn-optimized format for attestation. It uses a very compact but still extensible encoding method. This format is implementable by authenticators with limited resources (e.g., secure elements).
-
Specification Document: Section § 8.2 Packed Attestation Statement Format of this specification
-
WebAuthn Attestation Statement Format Identifier: tpm
-
Description: The TPM attestation statement format returns an attestation statement in the same format as the packed attestation statement format, although the rawData and signature fields are computed differently.
-
Specification Document: Section § 8.3 TPM Attestation Statement Format of this specification
-
WebAuthn Attestation Statement Format Identifier: android-key
-
Description: Platform authenticators on versions "N", and later, may provide this proprietary "hardware attestation" statement.
-
Specification Document: Section § 8.4 Android Key Attestation Statement Format of this specification
-
WebAuthn Attestation Statement Format Identifier: android-safetynet
-
Description: Android-based platform authenticators MAY produce an attestation statement based on the Android SafetyNet API.
-
Specification Document: Section § 8.5 Android SafetyNet Attestation Statement Format of this specification
-
WebAuthn Attestation Statement Format Identifier: fido-u2f
-
Description: Used with FIDO U2F authenticators
-
Specification Document: Section § 8.6 FIDO U2F Attestation Statement Format of this specification
12.2. WebAuthn Extension Identifier Registrations
This section registers the extension identifier values defined in Section § 9 WebAuthn Extensions in the IANA "WebAuthn Extension Identifier" registry established by [WebAuthn-Registries].
-
WebAuthn Extension Identifier: appid
-
Description: This authentication extension allows WebAuthn Relying Parties that have previously registered a credential using the legacy FIDO U2F JavaScript API [FIDOU2FJavaScriptAPI] to request an assertion.
-
Specification Document: Section § 10.1 FIDO AppID Extension (appid) of this specification
-
WebAuthn Extension Identifier: txAuthSimple
-
Description: This registration extension and authentication extension allows for a simple form of transaction authorization. A WebAuthn Relying Party can specify a prompt string, intended for display on a trusted device on the authenticator
-
Specification Document: Section § 10.3 Simple Transaction Authorization Extension (txAuthSimple) of this specification
-
WebAuthn Extension Identifier: txAuthGeneric
-
Description: This registration extension and authentication extension allows images to be used as transaction authorization prompts as well. This allows authenticators without a font rendering engine to be used and also supports a richer visual appearance than accomplished with the webauthn.txauth.simple extension.
-
Specification Document: Section § 10.4 Generic Transaction Authorization Extension (txAuthGeneric) of this specification
-
WebAuthn Extension Identifier: authnSel
-
Description: This registration extension allows a WebAuthn Relying Party to guide the selection of the authenticator that will be leveraged when creating the credential. It is intended primarily for WebAuthn Relying Parties that wish to tightly control the experience around credential creation.
-
Specification Document: Section § 10.5 Authenticator Selection Extension (authnSel) of this specification
-
WebAuthn Extension Identifier: exts
-
Description: This registration extension enables the WebAuthn Relying Party to determine which extensions the authenticator supports. The extension data is a list (CBOR array) of extension identifiers encoded as UTF-8 Strings. This extension is added automatically by the authenticator. This extension can be added to attestation statements.
-
Specification Document: Section § 10.6 Supported Extensions Extension (exts) of this specification
-
WebAuthn Extension Identifier: uvi
-
Description: This registration extension and authentication extension enables use of a user verification index. The user verification index is a value uniquely identifying a user verification data record. The UVI data can be used by servers to understand whether an authentication was authorized by the exact same biometric data as the initial key generation. This allows the detection and prevention of "friendly fraud".
-
Specification Document: Section § 10.7 User Verification Index Extension (uvi) of this specification
-
WebAuthn Extension Identifier: loc
-
Description: The location registration extension and authentication extension provides the client device's current location to the WebAuthn Relying Party, if supported by the client platform and subject to user consent.
-
Specification Document: Section § 10.8 Location Extension (loc) of this specification
-
WebAuthn Extension Identifier: uvm
-
Description: This registration extension and authentication extension enables use of a user verification method. The user verification method extension returns to the WebAuthn Relying Party which user verification methods (factors) were used for the WebAuthn operation.
-
Specification Document: Section § 10.9 User Verification Method Extension (uvm) of this specification
-
WebAuthn Extension Identifier: credProps
-
Description: This client registration extension enables reporting of a newly-created credential's properties, as determined by the client, to the calling WebAuthn Relying Party's web application.
-
Specification Document: Section § 10.11 Credential Properties Extension (credProps) of this specification
12.3. COSE Algorithm Registrations
This section registers identifiers for the following ECDAA algorithms in the IANA COSE Algorithms registry [IANA-COSE-ALGS-REG]. Note that [WebAuthn-COSE-Algs] also registers RSASSA-PKCS1-v1_5 [RFC8017] algorithms using SHA-2 and SHA-1 hash functions in the IANA COSE Algorithms registry [IANA-COSE-ALGS-REG], such as registering -257 for "RS256".
-
Name: ED256
-
Value: TBD (requested assignment -260)
-
Description: TPM_ECC_BN_P256 curve w/ SHA-256
-
Reference: Section 4.2 of [FIDOEcdaaAlgorithm]
-
Recommended: Yes
-
Name: ED512
-
Value: TBD (requested assignment -261)
-
Description: ECC_BN_ISOP512 curve w/ SHA-512
-
Reference: Section 4.2 of [FIDOEcdaaAlgorithm]
-
Recommended: Yes
13. Security Considerations
This specification defines a Web API and a cryptographic peer-entity authentication protocol. The Web Authentication API allows Web developers (i.e., "authors") to utilize the Web Authentication protocol in their registration and authentication ceremonies. The entities comprising the Web Authentication protocol endpoints are user-controlled WebAuthn Authenticators and a WebAuthn Relying Party's computing environment hosting the Relying Party's web application. In this model, the user agent, together with the WebAuthn Client, comprise an intermediary between authenticators and Relying Parties. Additionally, authenticators can attest to Relying Parties as to their provenance.
At this time, this specification does not feature detailed security considerations. However, the [FIDOSecRef] document provides a security analysis which is overall applicable to this specification. Also, the [FIDOAuthnrSecReqs] document suite provides useful information about authenticator security characteristics.
The below subsections comprise the current Web Authentication-specific security considerations. They are divided by audience; general security considerations are direct subsections of this section, while security considerations specifically for authenticator, client and Relying Party implementers are grouped into respective subsections.
13.1. Credential ID Unsigned
The credential ID is not signed. This is not a problem because all that would happen if an authenticator returns the wrong credential ID, or if an attacker intercepts and manipulates the credential ID, is that the WebAuthn Relying Party would not look up the correct credential public key with which to verify the returned signed authenticator data (a.k.a., assertion), and thus the interaction would end in an error.
13.2. Security considerations for authenticators
13.2.1. Attestation Certificate Hierarchy
A 3-tier hierarchy for attestation certificates is RECOMMENDED (i.e., Attestation Root, Attestation Issuing CA, Attestation Certificate). It is also RECOMMENDED that for each WebAuthn Authenticator device line (i.e., model), a separate issuing CA is used to help facilitate isolating problems with a specific version of an authenticator model.
If the attestation root certificate is not dedicated to a single WebAuthn Authenticator device line (i.e., AAGUID), the AAGUID SHOULD be specified in the attestation certificate itself, so that it can be verified against the authenticator data.
13.2.2. Attestation Certificate and Attestation Certificate CA Compromise
When an intermediate CA or a root CA used for issuing attestation certificates is compromised, WebAuthn Authenticator attestation key pairs are still safe although their certificates can no longer be trusted. A WebAuthn Authenticator manufacturer that has recorded the attestation public keys for their authenticator models can issue new attestation certificates for these keys from a new intermediate CA or from a new root CA. If the root CA changes, the WebAuthn Relying Parties MUST update their trusted root certificates accordingly.
A WebAuthn Authenticator attestation certificate MUST be revoked by the issuing CA if its private key has been compromised. A WebAuthn Authenticator manufacturer may need to ship a firmware update and inject new attestation private keys and certificates into already manufactured WebAuthn Authenticators, if the exposure was due to a firmware flaw. (The process by which this happens is out of scope for this specification.) If the WebAuthn Authenticator manufacturer does not have this capability, then it may not be possible for Relying Parties to trust any further attestation statements from the affected WebAuthn Authenticators.
If an ECDAA attestation private key has been compromised, it can be added to the RogueList (i.e., the list of revoked authenticators) maintained by the related ECDAA-Issuer.
See also the related security consideration for Relying Parties in § 13.4.4 Revoked Attestation Certificates.
13.3. Security considerations for clients
13.3.1. Browser Permissions Framework and Extensions
Web Authentication API implementations SHOULD leverage the browser permissions framework as much as possible when obtaining user permissions for certain extensions. An example is the location extension (see § 10.8 Location Extension (loc)), implementations of which SHOULD make use of the existing browser permissions framework for the Geolocation API.
13.4. Security considerations for Relying Parties
13.4.1. Cryptographic Challenges
As a cryptographic protocol, Web Authentication is dependent upon randomized challenges
to avoid replay attacks. Therefore, the values of both PublicKeyCredentialCreationOptions
.challenge
and PublicKeyCredentialRequestOptions
.challenge
MUST be randomly generated
by Relying Parties in an environment they trust (e.g., on the server-side), and the
returned challenge
value in the client’s
response MUST match what was generated. This SHOULD be done in a fashion that does not rely
upon a client’s behavior, e.g., the Relying Party SHOULD store the challenge temporarily
until the operation is complete. Tolerating a mismatch will compromise the security
of the protocol.
In order to prevent replay attacks, the challenges MUST contain enough entropy to make guessing them infeasible. Challenges SHOULD therefore be at least 16 bytes long.
13.4.2. Security Benefits for WebAuthn Relying Parties
The main benefits offered to WebAuthn Relying Parties by this specification include:
-
Users and accounts can be secured using widely compatible, easy-to-use multi-factor authentication.
-
The Relying Party does not need to provision authenticator hardware to its users. Instead, each user can independently obtain any conforming authenticator and use that same authenticator with any number of Relying Parties. The Relying Party can optionally enforce requirements on authenticators' security properties by inspecting the attestation statements returned from the authenticators.
-
Authentication ceremonies are resistant to man-in-the-middle attacks. Regarding registration ceremonies, see § 13.4.3 Attestation Limitations, below.
-
The Relying Party can automatically support multiple types of user verification - for example PIN, biometrics and/or future methods - with little or no code change, and can let each user decide which they prefer to use via their choice of authenticator.
-
The Relying Party does not need to store additional secrets in order to gain the above benefits.
As stated in the Conformance section, the Relying Party MUST behave as described in § 7 WebAuthn Relying Party Operations to obtain all of the above security benefits. However, one notable use case that departs slightly from this is described in the next section.
13.4.3. Attestation Limitations
This section is not normative.
When registering a new credential, the attestation statement, if present, may allow the WebAuthn Relying Party to derive assurances about various authenticator qualities. For example, the authenticator model, or how it stores and protects credential private keys. However, it is important to note that an attestation statement, on its own, provides no means for a Relying Party to verify that an attestation object was generated by the authenticator the user intended, and not by a man-in-the-middle attacker. For example, such an attacker could use malicious code injected into Relying Party script. The Relying Party must therefore rely on other means, e.g., TLS and related technologies, to protect the attestation object from man-in-the-middle attacks.
Under the assumption that a registration ceremony is completed securely, and that the authenticator maintains confidentiality of the credential private key, subsequent authentication ceremonies using that public key credential are resistant to man-in-the-middle attacks.
The discussion above holds for all attestation types. In all cases it is possible for a man-in-the-middle attacker to replace the PublicKeyCredential
object, including the attestation statement and the credential public key to be registered, and subsequently tamper with future authentication assertions scoped for the
same Relying Party and passing through the same attacker.
Such an attack would potentially be detectable; since the Relying Party has registered the attacker’s credential public key rather than the user’s, the attacker must tamper with all subsequent authentication ceremonies with that Relying Party: unscathed ceremonies will fail, potentially revealing the attack.
Attestation types other than Self Attestation and None can increase the difficulty of such attacks, since Relying Parties can possibly display authenticator information, e.g., model designation, to the user. An attacker might therefore need to use a genuine authenticator of the same model as the user’s authenticator, or the user might notice that the Relying Party reports a different authenticator model than the user expects.
Note: All variants of man-in-the-middle attacks described above are more difficult for an attacker to mount than a man-in-the-middle attack against conventional password authentication.
13.4.4. Revoked Attestation Certificates
If attestation certificate validation fails due to a revoked intermediate attestation CA certificate, and the Relying Party's policy requires rejecting the registration/authentication request in these situations, then it is RECOMMENDED that the Relying Party also un-registers (or marks with a trust level equivalent to "self attestation") public key credentials that were registered after the CA compromise date using an attestation certificate chaining up to the same intermediate CA. It is thus RECOMMENDED that Relying Parties remember intermediate attestation CA certificates during registration in order to un-register related public key credentials if the registration was performed after revocation of such certificates.
If an ECDAA attestation private key has been compromised, it can be added to the RogueList (i.e., the list of revoked authenticators) maintained by the related ECDAA-Issuer. The Relying Party SHOULD verify whether an authenticator belongs to the RogueList when performing ECDAA-Verify (see section 3.6 in [FIDOEcdaaAlgorithm]). For example, the FIDO Metadata Service [FIDOMetadataService] provides one way to access such information.
See also the related security consideration for authenticators in § 13.2.2 Attestation Certificate and Attestation Certificate CA Compromise.
13.4.5. Credential Loss and Key Mobility
This specification defines no protocol for backing up credential private keys, or for sharing them between authenticators. In general, it is expected that a credential private key never leaves the authenticator that created it. Losing an authenticator therefore, in general, means losing all credentials bound to the lost authenticator, which could lock the user out of an account if the user has only one credential registered with the Relying Party. Instead of backing up or sharing private keys, the Web Authentication API allows registering multiple credentials for the same user. For example, a user might register platform credentials on frequently used client devices, and one or more roaming credentials for use as backup and with new or rarely used client devices.
Relying Parties SHOULD allow and encourage users to register multiple credentials to the same account. Relying Parties SHOULD make use of the
and excludeCredentials
options to ensure that these
different credentials are bound to different authenticators.user
.id
14. Privacy Considerations
The privacy principles in [FIDO-Privacy-Principles] also apply to this specification.
This section is divided by audience; general privacy considerations are direct subsections of this section, while privacy considerations specifically for authenticator, client and Relying Party implementers are grouped into respective subsections.
14.1. De-anonymization Prevention Measures
This section is not normative.
Many aspects of the design of the Web Authentication API are motivated by privacy concerns. The main concern considered in this specification is the protection of the user’s personal identity, i.e., the identification of a human being or a correlation of separate identities as belonging to the same human being. Although the Web Authentication API does not use or provide any form of global identity, the following kinds of potentially correlatable identifiers are used:
-
The user’s credential IDs and credential public keys.
These are registered by the WebAuthn Relying Party and subsequently used by the user to prove possession of the corresponding credential private key. They are also visible to the client in the communication with the authenticator.
-
The user’s identities specific to each Relying Party, e.g., usernames and user handles.
These identities are obviously used by each Relying Party to identify a user in their system. They are also visible to the client in the communication with the authenticator.
-
The user’s biometric characteristic(s), e.g., fingerprints or facial recognition data [ISOBiometricVocabulary].
This is optionally used by the authenticator to perform user verification. It is not revealed to the Relying Party, but in the case of platform authenticators, it might be visible to the client depending on the implementation.
-
The models of the user’s authenticators, e.g., product names.
This is exposed in the attestation statement provided to the Relying Party during registration. It is also visible to the client in the communication with the authenticator.
-
The identities of the user’s authenticators, e.g., serial numbers.
This is possibly used by the client to enable communication with the authenticator, but is not exposed to the Relying Party.
Some of the above information is necessarily shared with the Relying Party. The following sections describe the measures taken to prevent malicious Relying Parties from using it to discover a user’s personal identity.
14.2. Anonymous, Scoped, Non-correlatable Public Key Credentials
This section is not normative.
Although Credential IDs and credential public keys are necessarily shared with the WebAuthn Relying Party to enable strong authentication, they are designed to be minimally identifying and not shared between Relying Parties.
-
Credential IDs and credential public keys are meaningless in isolation, as they only identify credential key pairs and not users directly.
-
Each public key credential is strictly scoped to a specific Relying Party, and the client ensures that its existence is not revealed to other Relying Parties. A malicious Relying Party thus cannot ask the client to reveal a user’s other identities.
-
The client also ensures that the existence of a public key credential is not revealed to the Relying Party without user consent. This is detailed further in § 14.5.1 Registration Ceremony Privacy and § 14.5.2 Authentication Ceremony Privacy. A malicious Relying Party thus cannot silently identify a user, even if the user has a public key credential registered and available.
-
Authenticators ensure that the credential IDs and credential public keys of different public key credentials are not correlatable as belonging to the same user. A pair of malicious Relying Parties thus cannot correlate users between their systems without additional information, e.g., a willfully reused username or e-mail address.
-
Authenticators ensure that their attestation certificates are not unique enough to identify a single authenticator or a small group of authenticators. This is detailed further in § 14.4.1 Attestation Privacy. A pair of malicious Relying Parties thus cannot correlate users between their systems by tracking individual authenticators.
Additionally, a client-side-resident public key credential source can optionally include a user handle specified by the Relying Party. The credential can then be used to both identify and authenticate the user. This means that a privacy-conscious Relying Party can allow the user to create an account without a traditional username, further improving non-correlatability between Relying Parties.
14.3. Authenticator-local Biometric Recognition
Biometric authenticators perform the biometric recognition internally in the authenticator - though for platform authenticators the biometric data might also be visible to the client, depending on the implementation. Biometric data is not revealed to the WebAuthn Relying Party; it is used only locally to perform user verification authorizing the creation and registration of, or authentication using, a public key credential. A malicious Relying Party therefore cannot discover the user’s personal identity via biometric data, and a security breach at a Relying Party cannot expose biometric data for an attacker to use for forging logins at other Relying Parties.
In the case where a Relying Party requires biometric recognition, this is performed locally by the biometric authenticator perfoming user verification and then signaling the result by setting the UV flag in the signed assertion response, instead of revealing the biometric data itself to the Relying Party.
14.4. Privacy considerations for authenticators
14.4.1. Attestation Privacy
Attestation certificates and attestation key pairs and can be used to track users or link various online identities of the same user together. This can be mitigated in several ways, including:
-
A WebAuthn Authenticator manufacturer may choose to ship authenticators in batches where authenticators in a batch share the same attestation certificate (called Basic Attestation or batch attestation). This will anonymize the user at the risk of not being able to revoke a particular attestation certificate if its private key is compromised. The authenticator manufacturer SHOULD then ensure that such batches are large enough to provide meaningful anonymization, while also minimizing the batch size in order to limit the number of affected users in case an attestation private key is compromised.
[UAFProtocol] requires that at least 100,000 authenticator devices share the same attestation certificate in order to produce sufficiently large groups. This may serve as guidance about suitable batch sizes.
-
A WebAuthn Authenticator may be capable of dynamically generating different attestation key pairs (and requesting related certificates) per-origin (similar to the Attestation CA approach). For example, an authenticator can ship with a master attestation private key (and certificate), and combined with a cloud-operated Anonymization CA, can dynamically generate per-origin attestation key pairs and attestation certificates.
Note: In various places outside this specification, the term "Privacy CA" is used to refer to what is termed here as an Anonymization CA. Because the Trusted Computing Group (TCG) also used the term "Privacy CA" to refer to what the TCG now refers to as an Attestation CA (ACA) [TCG-CMCProfile-AIKCertEnroll], and the envisioned functionality of an Anonymization CA is not firmly established, we are using the term Anonymization CA here to try to mitigate confusion in the specific context of this specification.
-
A WebAuthn Authenticator can implement Elliptic Curve based direct anonymous attestation (see [FIDOEcdaaAlgorithm]). Using this scheme, the authenticator generates a blinded attestation signature. This allows the WebAuthn Relying Party to verify the signature using the ECDAA-Issuer public key, but the attestation signature does not serve as a global correlation handle.
14.4.2. Privacy of personally identifying information Stored in Authenticators
Authenticators MAY provide additional information to clients outside what’s defined by this specification, e.g., to enable the client to provide a rich UI with which the user can pick which credential to use for an authentication ceremony. If an authenticator chooses to do so, it SHOULD NOT expose personally identifying information unless successful user verification has been performed. If the authenticator supports user verification with more than one concurrently enrolled user, the authenticator SHOULD NOT expose personally identifying information of users other than the currently verified user. Consequently, an authenticator that is not capable of user verification SHOULD NOT store personally identifying information.
For the purposes of this discussion, the user handle conveyed as the id
member of PublicKeyCredentialUserEntity
is not considered personally identifying information; see § 14.6.1 User Handle Contents.
These recommendations serve to prevent an adversary with physical access to an authenticator from extracting personally identifying information about the authenticator's enrolled user(s).
14.5. Privacy considerations for clients
14.5.1. Registration Ceremony Privacy
In order to protect users from being identified without consent, implementations of the [[Create]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
method need to take care to not leak information that
could enable a malicious WebAuthn Relying Party to distinguish between these cases, where "excluded" means that at least one of the credentials listed by the Relying Party in excludeCredentials
is bound to the authenticator:
-
No authenticators are present.
-
At least one authenticator is present, and at least one present authenticator is excluded.
If the above cases are distinguishable, information is leaked by which a malicious Relying Party could identify the user by probing for
which credentials are available. For example, one such information leak is if the client returns a
failure response as soon as an excluded authenticator becomes available. In this case - especially if the excluded authenticator is a platform authenticator - the Relying Party could detect that the ceremony was canceled before the
timeout and before the user could feasibly have canceled it manually, and thus conclude that at least one of the credentials listed in the excludeCredentials
parameter is available to the user.
The above is not a concern, however, if the user has consented to create a new credential before a distinguishable error is returned, because in this case the user has confirmed intent to share the information that would be leaked.
14.5.2. Authentication Ceremony Privacy
In order to protect users from being identified without consent, implementations of the [[DiscoverFromExternalSource]](origin, options, sameOriginWithAncestors)
method need to take care to not
leak information that could enable a malicious WebAuthn Relying Party to distinguish between these cases, where "named" means that the credential is listed by the Relying Party in allowCredentials
:
-
A named credential is not available.
-
A named credential is available, but the user does not consent to use it.
If the above cases are distinguishable, information is leaked by which a malicious Relying Party could identify the user by probing
for which credentials are available. For example, one such information leak is if the client returns a
failure response as soon as the user denies consent to proceed with an authentication ceremony. In this
case the Relying Party could detect that the ceremony was canceled by the user and not the timeout, and thus conclude that at least
one of the credentials listed in the allowCredentials
parameter is
available to the user.
14.5.3. Privacy Between Operating System Accounts
If a platform authenticator is included in a client device with a multi-user operating system, the platform authenticator and client device SHOULD work together to ensure that the existence of any platform credential is revealed only to the operating system user that created that platform credential.
14.6. Privacy considerations for Relying Parties
14.6.1. User Handle Contents
Since the user handle is not considered personally identifying information in § 14.4.2 Privacy of personally identifying information Stored in Authenticators, the Relying Party MUST NOT include personally identifying information, e.g., e-mail addresses or usernames, in the user handle. This includes hash values of personally identifying information, unless the hash function is salted with salt values private to the Relying Party, since hashing does not prevent probing for guessable input values. It is RECOMMENDED to let the user handle be 64 random bytes, and store this value in the user’s account.
14.6.2. Username Enumeration
While initiating a registration or authentication ceremony, there is a risk that the WebAuthn Relying Party might leak sensitive information about its registered users. For example, if a Relying Party uses e-mail addresses as usernames and an attacker attempts to initiate an authentication ceremony for "alex.p.mueller@example.com" and the Relying Party responds with a failure, but then successfully initiates an authentication ceremony for "j.doe@example.com", then the attacker can conclude that "j.doe@example.com" is registered and "alex.p.mueller@example.com" is not. The Relying Party has thus leaked the possibly sensitive information that "j.doe@example.com" has an account at this Relying Party.
The following is a non-normative, non-exhaustive list of measures the Relying Party may implement to mitigate or prevent information leakage due to such an attack:
-
-
If the Relying Party uses Relying Party-specific usernames to identify users:
-
When initiating a registration ceremony, disallow registration of usernames that are syntactically valid e-mail addresses.
Note: The motivation for this suggestion is that in this case the Relying Party probably has no choice but to fail the registration ceremony if the user attempts to register a username that is already registered, and an information leak might therefore be unavoidable. By disallowing e-mail addresses as usernames, the impact of the leakage can be mitigated since it will be less likely that a user has the same username at this Relying Party as at other Relying Parties.
-
-
If the Relying Party uses e-mail addresses to identify users:
-
When initiating a registration ceremony, interrupt the user interaction after the e-mail address is supplied and send a message to this address, containing an unpredictable one-time code and instructions for how to use it to proceed with the ceremony. Display the same message to the user in the web interface regardless of the contents of the sent e-mail and whether or not this e-mail address was already registered.
Note: This suggestion can be similarly adapted for other externally meaningful identifiers, for example, national ID numbers or credit card numbers — if they provide similar out-of-band contact information, for example, conventional postal address.
-
-
-
For authentication ceremonies:
-
If, when initiating an authentication ceremony, there is no account matching the provided username, continue the ceremony by invoking
navigator.credentials.get()
using a syntactically validPublicKeyCredentialRequestOptions
object that is populated with plausible imaginary values.This approach could also be used to mitigate privacy leakage via
allowCredentials
; see § 14.6.3 Privacy leak via credential IDs.Note: The username may be "provided" in various Relying Party-specific fashions: login form, session cookie, etc.
Note: If returned imaginary values noticeably differ from actual ones, clever attackers may be able to discern them and thus be able to test for existence of actual accounts. Examples of noticeably different values include if the values are always the same for all username inputs, or are different in repeated attempts with the same username input. The
allowCredentials
member could therefore be populated with pseudo-random values derived deterministically from the username, for example. -
When verifying an
AuthenticatorAssertionResponse
response from the authenticator, make it indistinguishable whether verification failed because the signature is invalid or because no such user or credential is registered. -
Perform a multi-step authentication ceremony, e.g., beginning with supplying username and password or a session cookie, before initiating the WebAuthn ceremony as a subsequent step. This moves the username enumation problem from the WebAuthn step to the preceding authentication step, where it may be easier to solve.
-
14.6.3. Privacy leak via credential IDs
This section is not normative.
This privacy consideration applies to Relying Parties that support authentication ceremonies with a non-empty allowCredentials
argument as the first authentication step.
For example, if using authentication with non-resident credentials as the first authentication step.
In this case the allowCredentials
argument risks leaking personally identifying information,
since it exposes the user’s credential IDs to an unauthenticated caller. Credential IDs are designed to not be correlatable between Relying Parties,
but the length of a credential ID might be a hint as to what type of authenticator created it.
It is likely that a user will use the same username and set of authenticators for several Relying Parties,
so the number of credential IDs in allowCredentials
and their lengths
might serve as a global correlation handle to de-anonymize the user.
Knowing a user’s credential IDs also makes it possible to confirm guesses about the user’s identity
given only momentary physical access to one of the user’s authenticators.
In order to prevent such information leakage, the Relying Party could for example:
-
Perform a separate authentication step, such as username and password authentication or session cookie authentication, before initiating the WebAuthn authentication ceremony and exposing the user’s credential IDs.
-
Use resident credentials, so the
allowCredentials
argument is not needed.
If the above prevention measures are not available,
i.e., if allowCredentials
needs to be exposed given only a username,
the Relying Party could mitigate the privacy leak using the same approach of returning imaginary credential IDs as discussed in § 14.6.2 Username Enumeration.
15. Acknowledgements
We thank the following people for their reviews of, and contributions to, this specification: Yuriy Ackermann, James Barclay, Richard Barnes, Dominic Battré, John Bradley, Domenic Denicola, Rahul Ghosh, Brad Hill, Jing Jin, Wally Jones, Ian Kilpatrick, Axel Nennker, Yoshikazu Nojima, Kimberly Paulhamus, Adam Powers, Yaron Sheffer, Nick Steele, Anne van Kesteren, Johan Verrept, and Boris Zbarsky.Thanks to Adam Powers for creating the overall registration and authentication flow diagrams (Figure 1 and Figure 2).
We thank Anthony Nadalin, John Fontana, and Richard Barnes for their contributions as co-chairs of the Web Authentication Working Group.
We also thank Wendy Seltzer, Samuel Weiler, and Harry Halpin for their contributions as our W3C Team Contacts.