Tesla iOS app randomly requests password

[jennamarietx]

Beginning with the past month or so, my Tesla app has started to occasionally demand a password, instead of taking Touch-ID as it always has before. This usually occurs at an inopportune time, such as just after parking the vehicle and trying to turn on the A/C while walking into a store. Highly inconvenient, since I have to stop, look up the password, copy it and then paste into the app, etc. Had the car over a year now and this "feature" has just presented itself; WTF, has Tesla become as paranoid as Apple over the security of a fingerprint?

 

[jboy210]

Might be related to their password database has been messed up the last week or so. Took me 10 days to change my password.

 

[r0xx0r]

It has been asking me every 30 days.

 

[mxnym]

It has been asking me every 30 days.

This sounds like normal behavior if you don't have a fingerprint sign-in. OP has a fingerprint sign-in. I don't, so I can't really help with that, but I've also noticed that it always asks for the password to start the car, and otherwise only every 30 days for anything else.

OP: you probably already know this and it's inconvenient specifically when you've already forgotten this step, but on the off chance you use your phone for this every time, you can set "keep climate on" via the MCU before you exit the vehicle.

 

[r0xx0r]

This sounds like normal behavior if you don't have a fingerprint sign-in. OP has a fingerprint sign-in. I don't, so I can't really help with that, but I've also noticed that it always asks for the password to start the car, and otherwise only every 30 days for anything else.

OP: you probably already know this and it's inconvenient specifically when you've already forgotten this step, but on the off chance you use your phone for this every time, you can set "keep climate on" via the MCU before you exit the vehicle.

Touch-ID doesn’t matter. It will validate the credential too. I have touchID enabled on my app.

 

[jboy210]

Does the password work fine on the website? It might be expired if it has been a year.

 

[dgatwood]

Touch-ID doesn’t matter. It will validate the credential too. I have touchID enabled on my app.

This. Basically, Tesla isn't doing authentication the right way. I suspect they're using some a cookie for authentication, and then not refreshing it automatically every time the app launches like any sane app developer would. As a result, the app has to do a full login every month when the cookie expires.

Worse, they don't let you get the password from the keychain (using Touch ID) when it asks you to re-enter your password. You instead have to cancel authentication, which results in a dire warning that all data stored in the app will be lost, then sign back in again from the main app sign-in screen like you're launching it for the first time. (Or, I suppose, you could clumsily switch over to the Settings app and manually copy it to your clipboard and paste it into the app.)

Pretty much every aspect of the way they do authentication in their iOS app is wrong. The app is kind of a mess. And I really don't understand why it isn't improving. Surely people have pointed these problems out by now....