Apple Watch Unlock Option Disappearing / Not Functioning

JamesHenderson

We'll keep on eye out so that we catch your diagnostics report as soon as you are able to send it in. 🙂

-Dave

sorry - I keep forgetting to do this, but there have been plenty of reoccurances...

JamesHenderson

Thank you! Once you send in the diagnostics report please post the Support ID here and I'll make sure that it makes it to the right team. 🙂

-Dave

That good to hear and will do.

JamesHenderson

I'm sorry for the frustration. The development team is continuing to investigate the issue and there are improvements in the latest nightly versions of 1Password for Mac that are being tested. So that we can see if one of these improvements may help you can you please wait until you encounter the issue again and then I'd like to ask you to create a diagnostics report from your Mac:

Sending Diagnostics Reports (Mac)

Attach the diagnostics to an email message addressed to support+forum@1password.com.

With your email please include:

• A link to this thread: https://1password.community/discussion/comment/695800/#Comment_695800
• Your forum username: JamesHenderson
• Please do not post your diagnostic report to the forum. This is for your privacy and security.

Please send the entire file.

You should receive an automated reply from our BitBot assistant with a Support ID number. Please post that number here. Thanks very much!

-Dave

ref: dev/core/core#18393

This is definitely a 1Password problem; please stop blaming Apple.

Whenever 1Password will not unlock with Apple Watch I try other apps (with Apple Watch unlock functionality) and they all unlock just fine. I then try 1Password again which it continues to not unlock.

I've just done it again right now...

I am so frustrated with 1Password being in denial over this which also means it will never be fixed.

mixture

Sorry to hear you're still having trouble with this.

Why does the Mac unlock itself with the Watch work every time, but not 1Password?

Although I'm not familiar with the inner workings of macOS, I do know that unlocking 1Password requires the use of your Mac's Secure Enclave chip, whereas unlocking your Mac doesn't. That means that although these two actions of using your Apple Watch to unlock something look very similar, they're being handled very differently by macOS. Unlocking your Mac when it's asleep or in screen saver isn't decryption, it's access control. Unlocking 1Password, however, is always a decryption task which needs a decryption key stored in the Secure Enclave.

We also have to keep in mind that 1Password can't do any detection of your Apple Watch. That's all down to macOS, and it has to report whether there's an Apple Watch connected or not each time 1Password asks. Any and all use of biometrics (which includes Apple Watch in this case) must be co-ordinated by macOS and the Secure Enclave.

There's a parallel here with Touch ID. If you have a Touch ID-enabled Mac attached to an external display, keyboard, and mouse, you won't be prompted to use Touch ID to unlock 1Password if the lid is closed. This isn't because 1Password knows the lid is closed (and that therefore, the Touch ID sensor is unavailable). It's because macOS knows, and responds to 1Password with a "biometrics not available"-type message when 1Password asks if it's available. In those cases, 1Password will fall back to asking for your account password to unlock.

From what we know so far, it seems like macOS isn't always reporting the Apple Watch's availability to 1Password accurately, which manifests itself as if 1Password seemingly not working as you'd expect, even though 1Password has no way of knowing whether your Apple Watch is out of range, switched off, or if it had been unpaired from the Mac, or is unavailable for some other reason. Because of the Mac's security architecture, 1Password has to take what macOS says as the truth, since it has no way to verify otherwise, and if that "upstream" information isn't accurate, 1Password will believe it.

We're hopeful that Apple can get to the bottom of why this is happening and remediate it so that apps like 1Password, or any others that unlock with Apple Watch, won't face this problem in the long term.

Ventura 13.5 (MacBook Pro 16" M2 Max)
WatchOS 9.6 (Apple Watch Ultra)
1Password 8.10.9

I still have this issue.

Mac itself unlocks 100% of the time with the Watch.

After Mac has been unlocked with the watch, 1Password unlock with the Watch works about maybe 50% of time immediately, and for the remaining 50% it will take about 20-30 minutes before it starts working (if I don't do anything in terms of switching Watch unlock feature on and off). For the 1Password unlocking with Watch starting to work, I never need to do anything specific, just wait that approx 20-30 minutes after Mac has been unlocked with the Watch. And indeed about 50% of times the 1Password unlock also works instantly after unlocking the Mac with the Watch.

I don't put my Mac to sleep, I only turn my display off with the hot corner. So this issue isn't just related to sleep, waking from sleep, and unlocking, but also if the display has been long enough off.

I would say if the display has been only off for an hour or so, I rarely if ever encounter the 1Password not being able to be unlocked with the Watch for the first 20-30 mins or so. The issue usually happens overnight when the display has been off for several hours or when I've just otherwise been away from the computer for several hours and the display has been off.

Anyway, it's still frustrating and shouldn't be this unreliable. Why does the Mac unlock itself with the Watch work every time, but not 1Password? There's a bug somewhere, and I'm not surprised if it's in Apple's own code, and not 1Password's. Hopefully it gets fixed with the Sonoma release.

Noted for the team homebrewcrew Thanks.

Same issue
Apple M2 Max - macOS Ventura 13.4.1 (c)
1Password for Mac 8.10.8 (81008045)
Apple Watch Series 4 - watchOS 9.5.2
^ all software is currently on the latest version