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matrix-spec/proposals/2611-remove-login-auth-type.md

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MSC2611: Remove m.login.token User-Interactive Authentication type from the specification

The client-server API specification defines a number of "authentication types" for use with the User-Interactive Authentication protocol.

Of these, m.login.token is unused and confusing. This MSC proposes removing it.

Proposal

The definition of token-based authentication is unclear about how this authentication type should be used. It suggests "via some external service, such as email or SMS", but in practice those validation mechanisms have their own token-submission mechanisms (for example, the submit_url field of the responses from /account/password/email/requestToken and /account/password/msisdn/requestToken respectively). Additionally, the specification requires that "the server must encode the user ID in the token", which seems at odds with any token which can be sent to a user over SMS.

Additional confusion stems from the presence of an m.login.token login type, which is used quite differently: it forms part of the single-sign-on login flow. For clarity: this proposal does not suggest making any changes to the m.login.token login type.

In practice, we are not aware of any implementations of the m.login.token authentication type, and the inconsistency adds unnecessary confusion to the specification.

Potential Issues

It's possible that somebody has found a use for this mechanism. However, that would necessarily entail some custom development of clients and servers, so is not materially affected by the removal from the specification.