The Password Paradox

There I was yesterday, six in the morning, alone on the car dealership forecourt, indulging in a spot of pre-opening graft. Not polishing bonnets or lining up air fresheners, no – I was dismantling the old wooden decking outside the sales container. The container itself – once the nerve centre of the business in leaner times – is now scheduled for removal and replacement by a more modern variant.

But the wood had to go, and early morning was the only chance to deal with it undisturbed, because come ten o'clock the gates open and in roll the browsers with strong opinions and weak budgets, taking up parking space I had devoted to my trailer.

So, there I am, crowbar in hand, pulling up decking like a man possessed, when I suddenly remember – I’ve left my phone at home. Not misplaced, not tucked in the glovebox. Properly forgotten. Still sat on the kitchen counter, humming quietly to itself while I’m out here in the cold making splinters.

Not usually a disaster. But this morning I’d planned to message the boss – just in case he was trying to reach me, or had some early instruction like “could you give the kitchen a quick wipe.” So I thought: no problem. I’ll log into WhatsApp via the office PC. We live in a world of cloud-based convenience, after all.

Except we don’t. First hurdle: my WhatsApp login is rather complex and I can't remember it.

Fine, I think – I’ll get the password from Dashlane, my digital brain, which is the only password I have to remember. Except Dashlane, with all the warmth of a customs officer on his third unpaid overtime shift, says: “We’ve sent a verification code to your phone.” Two-step verification!

And that’s when it hits me. I am in the office. On the office machine. At the dealership where I work part-time. The security cameras are capturing my every move in glorious 4K. But because I don’t have my rectangular permission slip – the phone – I am apparently no more trustworthy than a Russian hacker in flip-flops.

It’s not just frustrating – it’s farcical. In our increasingly “smart” world, the system is too stupid to believe it’s me unless I can unlock my own phone to get permission to access my own password to access the messaging app on a known device in a known place doing a known job.

This isn’t two-factor authentication. This is two-fingered insult. Yes, there probably is a work-around, but it would take an hour to read all the blurb. I can't pone Hay on the office phone, because I don't know her mobile number - when I phone her, I don't punch in her number, but her name. We all do that, because the only number we can remember is our own.

We’re not some backstreet banger yard with plastic flags and dog-eared logbooks. We sell proper stuff – late-plate Audis, low-mileage Mercs, BMWs that have never seen a child seat. Our clients expect polish and precision. And yet, behind the curtain, I’m a grown man scuppered by a missing phone, locked out of everything while trying to send a message like some Dickensian office boy begging the foreman for a slate and a stick of chalk.

Next time, I’ll write “CALL ME ON THE OFFICE PHONE” in thick black marker on a bit of discarded composite cladding and prop it up directly in front of the high-definition CCTV. The boss can read it from his laptop while sipping his artisan pour-over, marvelling at the cutting-edge efficiency of his high-end used car operation. He'll know I'm there anyway, as I triggered the alarm at 6am and switched it off, and he gets notifications whenever the alarm is triggered.

Primitive? Maybe. But at least that doesn’t require facial recognition and a code sent by semaphore.

It only struck me later that I could have phoned my mobile - Hay could have answered it. Duh!