iCloud Keychain is a handy feature. It allows users to quickly and easily access their usernames and passwords for apps and websites, making logging in across Apple devices relatively painless. But, if there is one pain point, it’s with the feature not bothering with usernames sometimes. But Apple’s addressing that issue in the next software update for iOS and macOS.
Earlier this week, Apple seeded the third betas of iOS 15.4, iPadOS 15.4, and macOS Monterey 12.3 to developers. (Public beta testers can now get in on the fun, too.) And, with that latest update, it has been revealed (via MacRumors) by Ricky Mondello (@rmondello), an Apple Safari employee, on Twitter that iCloud Keychain is getting an improvement. Specifically, how it handles saving passwords without usernames.
Mainly, it won’t do it any longer. Which is good!
Right now, iCloud Keychain is more than happy to save a password for an app or website that might not have a username associated with it. In the moment that might not be an issue, depending on how the log-in process is handled. However, down the road when the user tries to log in again but iCloud Keychain doesn’t have a username to go along with that password, issues can arise.
As noted by Mondello, though, iCloud Keychain in iOS 15.4, iPadOS 15.4, and macOS Monterey 12.3 will no longer save passwords without usernames. The software will prompt the user to include a username before the password is saved. And it looks like Safari will even try to fill in a username on its own, based on available information:
In iOS 15.4 beta and macOS 12.3 beta, when Safari isn’t sure, it’ll prompt you for the username for a password, rather than silently save it sans user name. Sometimes Safari will prefill its best guess here.
And we didn’t sneak it in. We intentionally addressed a pain point. 😎 https://t.co/mfrcXk9GT6
— Ricky Mondello (@rmondello) February 16, 2022
The new feature should go live for all users once the software updates for iOS, iPadOS, and macOS go live sometime soon. The updates are expected to arrive sometime in March.
In related news, iCloud Keychain will also let users add notes to their saved passwords in iOS 15.4.
Are you looking forward to this new feature when Apple releases the software updates?