The Hidden Costs Behind Implementing Passkeys on your own!

Ever since FIDO Alliance announced the formal release and rolling out of their passwordless authentication specification in 2021 - Passkeys, this innovative and revolutionary login standard has taken the tech and authentication industry by storm! Backed by some of the bigshot global companies such as Google, Apple, Microsoft, PayPal, and eBay, Passkeys have gained massive popularity. Several small to medium-sized companies are looking forward to implementing passkeys into their websites/ mobile applications in the near future. Passkeys is a phishing-resistant technology that makes it impossible for hackers to gain access to a passkey-protected website, even with the most sophisticated hacking tools. The top-notch security added with the promise of an impeccable user experience has contributed massively towards the growing popularity and accelerated adoption rates of this authentication specification.

However, when it comes to implementing Passkeys, many companies are trying to implement passkeys on their own, without the aid of a third-party service provider. While it may seem to be an easy task, there are several hidden costs for integrating Passkeys that most companies fail to take into account. A cumulation of these costs may range between $80,000 to $100,000 draining companies of their hard-earned revenue.

Here are three hidden costs that companies may encounter while building passkeys from scratch -

1. Implementation cost

One of the inevitable expenses of integrating Passkeys from scratch is development cost. Although Passkeys are a fairly new concept, the problem lies in the documentation of the code base. Due to imprecise documentation and several gaps within the recorded documents, developers will face massive challenges while building Passkeys from the scratch. In order to successfully integrate Passkeys into their website/ mobile application, companies require the full-time work of at least 2 back-end developers and one front-end developer for a span of 4-6 months. Additionally, 1-2 product managers need to dedicate themselves full-time in order to successfully complete integration within the stipulated timeline.

According to Glassdoor and PayScale, the average annual salary of backend developers ranges somewhere between $79,000 -$ 81,000. The HR report data presented by Salary.com places the average salary of a front-end developer at $119,000, with base salaries starting from $95,000. Additionally, the average salaries of product managers range somewhere between $100,000 to $120,000. Moreover, since Passkeys are a relatively new concept, companies need to spend additional money on training the team. A culmination of all these expenses can impact a company severely, especially when there is a chance that the implementation might fail and require being rebuilt from scratch.

2. Maintenance cost

While most companies just focus on the cost of implementation, they forget to take into account the fact that Passkeys are not free to store and maintain. Passkeys are highly sophisticated and require additional infrastructure to operate efficiently. Any company integrating Passkeys into their website/ mobile application will require designated user management tools and sufficient system cloud storage in order to efficiently store the Passkey credentials of all their users. 

If a company has to invest in a plethora of user management tools and subscriptions every month, it would result in unnecessary money drainage for businesses. These tools, along with an additional expense on databases and cloud storage can totally be avoided if companies choose to rely on third-party Passkey service providers rather than implementing Passkeys from the scratch.

3. Encryption and security costs

One can never take too many precautions when it comes to online security. While Passkeys are a phishing-resistant technology, monitoring the overall security can never be neglected. Enabling 24/7 surveillance and implementing additional security features safeguards sensitive user information, keeping them away from the grasp of malicious hackers. 

Companies building Passkeys from the scratch will have to make additional expenditures on the encryption processes and security features to create a highly secure and foolproof ecosystem for their clients, protecting user information against any unprecedented security breach.

How Can SoundAuth Help?

Building Passkeys from the scratch can be cumbersome for the employees and financially draining for the companies. Moreover, it may take the company over half a year to successfully transition into the passwordless future. To avoid all the hassles, Trillbit has come up with a no-code/low-code Passkey integration solution - SoundAuth, designed to help companies switch to Passkeys with ease.

Our experienced team and ready-to-implement Passkey solution can help companies switch to Passkeys within a day without having to go through the unnecessary hassle of building everything from scratch. This helps companies save hundreds of thousands of dollars in revenue, a significant sum that they can reinvest into their businesses. Furthermore, due to extensive experience in authentication, our experts can easily take care of any technical challenges, both during the implementation and post-Passkey adoption. Companies can completely rely on SoundAuth to take care of all their authentication needs, while they get to focus on their business.

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Interested to know how SoundAuth can help your company transition from passwords to Passkeys? Sign up with us at SoundAuth.com and register for early access to our Passkeys solution.!