I was trying to set up the outlook email application on a cheap windows laptop when the trouble started.
Previously, I had received a Yubico token to use for a authentication method in place of passwords. Wired mag had given them to subscribers. I thought I would try it on GMAIL but could not get it to work.
I had left 2FA, two factor authentication, so I changed the reply from Google to a notification to my iOS devices. So the first hurdle was having to go to my iMac and open up the password manager to see what the regular password was. You have to have 2 ways of identification. My network is messed up from Hackers so I wrote it down and entered it directly to the windows box. Oh, and to get the password from password manager requires knowing the password for the password ap which could have @FA but that will go down another hole.
I enter the pw and Outlook client on the windows machine for my Gmail account and then I need the 2FA code which will be sent to my phone or iPad. For some reason, I am not receiving the notification on windows so open the iPad and it can’t find it. Then I check for my iPhone but it is under some papers and the battery is dead. So even though I go back to my Mac and log into iCloud to use Find My Phone, which requires another password and 2 factor notification which is sent to the dead iPhone I get in only to be told it doesn’t function when out of power. By now I forgot what the hell I was doing and the whole purpose was to receive an email from Gmail. After entering more passwords I still can’t get gmail working on the windows machine.
If anybody thinks this is stupid and bad design tell the tech industry to standardize on a method that is not so convoluted. The last thing we need is the Federal Government designing a solution,. They would use it to spy on its citizens. And it probably change every coup[le of years.
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