Developers Discuss Passwordless Authentication at Tech Tuesday Event

In attempts to usher in a renewed area of technical connection and education, ReactATL, Atlanta JavaScript, and Atlanta Vue.js teamed up in Tech Square to host an evening for software developers and tech professionals centered around networking, shared learnings, unique presentations, coding exercises, and more. 

Back together in person for the first time in two-and-a-half years, the three long-standing tech meetup groups wanted to embrace the opportunity to get together to share technical knowledge and connect as a community. So, they collaborated to host an event for local community members, tech enthusiasts, and developers to gather at The Clubhouse to hear from a guest speaker, participate in a hands-on activity, and of course, connect with other individuals!

The February edition of the Tech Tuesday event series kicked off with networking, where attendees mixed and mingled, sharing current projects they’re working on, and catching up from previous events. After some light housekeeping items, the main attraction began.

For the February event, the guest speaker was Ceora Ford, a Developer Advocate for Okta. Okta, an Auth0 company, is a leading identity management platform with more than 6K employees serving 18K+ enterprise customers. 

For her presentation, Ceora highlighted the technical concept of “A Developer’s Guide to Passwordless – As Told Through Beyonce.” Passwordless authentication, a new technology, does not mean no authentication required, but rather refers to different authentication methods that can include techniques like biometrics (fingerprints, faceID), magic links via text or email, passkeys, one-time passwords, and push notifications. Ceora presented an overview of this concept, including security pros and cons, as well as how to implement them in the process of software development.

To make the presentation entertaining and to provide a personal experience, Ceora covered the topic through the lens of trying to get tickets for a Beyonce concert and being delayed due to password issues. This is an ongoing project that she is documenting via live streams on her Twitch, and is a prominent topic in software development today. Throughout the presentation, Cerora effortlessly explained all the in-depth intricacies of password protection as well, for both the end user and developer – not an easy feat.

Following the presentation, Ceora answered questions related to the topic, including potential security concerns for different approaches to passwordless authentication, where passkeys are stored, whether there is oversight for authentication methods, and even what her favorite Beyonce song is!

After the Q&A guests continued to stick around, further discussing what they just learned and sharing their personal insights and experiences. 

Security is increasingly important not only for protecting the data of end users, but for ensuring that software developers are building apps that can keep user data safe. By sharing educational resources around the topic of authentication from a leader in authentication technology these meetups help ensure Atlanta software developers are on the technical forefront in this field!