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Gmail warning—it’s time to act now.
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This is the year AI attacks come of age. So we were warned before 2025 began, and so it has turned out. While these include targeted attacks on individuals, which even include fraudulent support calls, nothing should be more frightening than a new video proving GenAI platforms can be prompted to carry out attacks on their own. We’re still early days on this, but when it evolves it will scale beyond anything we’ve seen before.
A quiet announcement from Microsoft has just neatly framed the problem. “To ensure you never lose access to your Microsoft account,” it said, “we will prompt you to add a secondary email or recovery phone number to your account.” This is in addition to your Microsoft email, and for the majority of users that will mean Gmail. If you lose access to your Gmail account, per new AI threats, then you can add this to the risks.
ForbesApple’s Update Decision—Here’s The Bad News For iPhone UsersBy Zak Doffman
Email is a woefully archaic platform and the idea we still need “recovery emails” in 2025 that can be used to reset passwords is slightly ludicrous. While Google’s decision to replace SMS for 2FA with QR codes made headlines, the reality is that users need to move to passkeys as soon as they can.
Passkeys are not perfect — with multiple teething issues still to be worked out, but they are the best we have today. Passkeys combine your own hardware with your own biometrics, which is the closest you can get to a dedicated security key without having to carry one around. And with passkeys in place, you can delete basic passwords and 2FA, as you don’t want any form of compromisable account access to remain in place.
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