Bug 207806

Summary: [WebAuthn] Any plan to support NFC APDU short length encoding ?
Product: WebKit Reporter: nuno.sung <nuno.sung>
Component: WebKit Misc.Assignee: Nobody <webkit-unassigned>
Status: NEW ---    
Severity: Normal CC: jiewen_tan, loginllama, webkit-unassigned
Priority: P2    
Version: WebKit Nightly Build   
Hardware: Unspecified   
OS: Unspecified   
Bug Depends on:    
Bug Blocks: 181943    

Description nuno.sung 2020-02-14 21:58:31 PST
As the desciription under
https://github.com/WebKit/webkit/blob/master/Source/WebCore/Modules/webauthn/apdu/ApduCommand.h
"This class implements only the extended length encoding."

There are still many legancy nfc java card for U2F can support short length encoding.
Comment 1 Jiewen Tan 2020-02-15 16:29:51 PST
(In reply to nuno.sung from comment #0)
> As the desciription under
> https://github.com/WebKit/webkit/blob/master/Source/WebCore/Modules/webauthn/
> apdu/ApduCommand.h
> "This class implements only the extended length encoding."
> 
> There are still many legancy nfc java card for U2F can support short length
> encoding.

Besides supporting legacy devices, is there any other reasons to introduce short length encoding? I want to have a better understanding of its benefits to prioritize the work.
Comment 2 nuno.sung 2020-02-16 07:25:37 PST
(In reply to Jiewen Tan from comment #1)
> Besides supporting legacy devices, is there any other reasons to introduce
> short length encoding? I want to have a better understanding of its benefits
> to prioritize the work.

Thanks for your consideration.
Because these device still can be supported by other FIDO clients of Windows10 and Android with short APUD encoding. Although I don't know if they have other reasons for this support. And some users will be happy to keep using them on iOS .
Comment 3 login Llama 2020-08-25 19:52:20 PDT
Most authenticators support both short and extended length.

The reason is that some number of desktop CCID readers don't support extended length encoding,  If you know it is not a problem with the built in iOS reader then I wouldn't make it a high priority.  

If you are planning on supporting external readers on OSX like Windows then you will need to support short encoding as a fallback. 

NFC can be a bit of a pain in the ass but it is better than blue tooth.