Yahoo Mail is getting a major overhaul for its 18th birthday. Yahoo has redesigned the Yahoo Mail apps for Android and iOS and added support for managing Outlook.com, Hotmail, and AOL Mail accounts through Yahoo Mail.
Login to the Yahoo Mail website and you can link multiple accounts to manage your mail in one place. The mobile apps are getting an even bigger update, with a retooled user interface. But there’s one major new feature for both mobile and web users: you no longer need to enter a password to login to your account..
So how does Yahoo make sure you are who you say you are? By sending push notifications that allow you to login without typing out a password.
The new login system is called Yahoo Account Key, and in order to use it you’ll need to link your mobile device with your account. Then all you need to do is enter your email address when you want login. Yahoo will send a notification to your device which you can tap to login.
Not only can you use Yahoo Account Key to login to the Yahoo Mail app on your phone or tablet, but you can also use it on the web. When you go to login to your account on a web browser, Yahoo can send a message to you phone. Tap, and you’ll automatically be logged in. If that doesn’t work, you can always login the old fashioned way.
This system means you don’t need to remember a complicated password or worry about it falling into the wrong hands… you just have to worry about your phone falling into the wrong hands, so you should probably make sure to protect your device with a password, pattern, PIN, or fingerprint.
Yahoo Account Key is launching with the new version of Yahoo Mail, but eventually the company plans to bring it to other apps.
Other updates in the latest version of Yahoo Mail include speed improvements, Yahoo News integration, swipe gestures to mark a message as read or to delete it, and support for photos from Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn.
Yahoo is now rolling out its new Yahoo Mail apps to the App Store and Google Play.
I don’t see anything about this that is easier or more secure. Maybe we’ll get lucky and they’ll just dump this dumb idea quickly.
Ironic that the company that makes you enter your password every 30 days to go to their web content is worried about people needing to remember their password.
Actually, I think it’s the opposite of ironic: Yahoo wants you to keep logging into their services, but wants to make it easier to do that securely without having to either create an easy-to-remember password or remember a complicated one.