Amazon, PayPal and Klarna: the race for safer sign-ins ahead of Black Friday and Peak Season

• Just 17% of Amazon logins and 18% of PayPal logins use a passkey, with Black Friday fewer than seven weeks away

• Even at Google, the best performer, roughly seven in ten logins still don’t use a passkey

• Passkey use is surging at the brands shoppers use to check credit, buy tickets and pay later, with Experian up 383% and Ticketmaster up 218% in a single quarter

• Recent high-profile retail cyberattacks have put security in focus just as peak season shopping gets under way

As shoppers prepare for Black Friday and Christmas deals, most logins at the biggest retail and payment names still rely on something other than a passkey. New research from Dashlane shows passkeys feature in fewer than one in five logins at Amazon (17%) and PayPal (18%), and fewer than one in ten at eBay (8%).

Released as part of Cyber Security Awareness Month, the 2026 Dashlane Passkey Power 20 report ranks how far Google, PayPal, Amazon, eBay and others have come in replacing passwords, and which shopping and payment brands are moving fastest. It measures passkey use as a share of total logins, globally, analysing Dashlane data. Google tops the ranking at 28%, which still leaves roughly seven in ten of its logins without a passkey.

Christophe Frenet, Chief Product Officer at Dashlane, commented: ‘Black Friday brings a rush of offers, purchases and account logins, but it also means an increase in cybercriminal activity. Shoppers want to get on with buying, without struggling to remember passwords or worrying about whether a sign-in page is genuine.’

He continued: ‘Passkeys make signing in simpler while protecting against phishing and stolen-password attacks. Retailers need to make that safer option easier to find and use, especially as we head into the Christmas shopping rush. Offering it is a start, but getting customers to adopt it is what matters.’

Retail cyber threats put sign-ins in the spotlight ahead of Christmas

The findings come as recent high-profile cyber incidents have put retail security under scrutiny. The festive rush gives criminals more openings, and every new retailer account adds another login to protect. Dashlane data shows the average person now manages more than 300 passwords, and credential abuse remains one of the three most common initial attack vectors.

Passkeys let people sign in with their device’s fingerprint, face recognition or PIN instead of typing a password. Unlike passwords, they are phishing-resistant by design and can’t be reused by criminals in credential-stuffing attacks.

For retailers preparing for Black Friday and Christmas, the findings point to an opportunity to make account access both simpler and more secure. But offering passkeys is only the first step, and customers need to find the option, understand it and feel confident using it.

The brands moving fastest

Brands familiar to UK consumers also feature among the fastest-growing services. Between the first and second quarters of 2026, measured passkey authentications increased by 383% at Experian, 310% at Meta, 218% at Ticketmaster and 64% at Klarna. PayPal, already one of the highest-ranked brands on the Power 20, also grew 66% over the same period.

Overall momentum is strong. Monthly passkey authentications among Dashlane users have nearly doubled to 2.5 million, and 57% of users now store at least one passkey, up from 40% last year.

Passkey share of logins, July 2025–June 2026

• Google: 28%

• PayPal: 18%

• Amazon: 17%

• eBay: 8%

Fastest-growing passkey use, Q1 to Q2 2026

• Experian: +383%

• Meta: +310%

• Ticketmaster: +218%

• PayPal: +66%

• Klarna: +64%

What the leaders are doing differently

The report suggests the services at the top of the ranking make passkeys the obvious, easy choice. Google has made passkeys the default sign-in option for personal accounts since 2023 and still has the highest passkey share of any major service measured. Amazon has found that emphasising convenience works better than emphasising security when encouraging adoption.

What shoppers can do

• Stay alert to fraudulent offers and payment requests during the sales season.

• Switch on passkeys wherever shopping, email and payment accounts support them.

• Avoid reusing passwords and use a password manager to create and store unique passwords for accounts that still require them.

• Enable two-factor authentication on important accounts, especially email, which can be used to reset other passwords.

• Go directly to the retailer’s website or app rather than following links in unexpected sales emails or delivery texts.

• Pause before paying and be wary of unusually cheap offers and requests to pay outside a retailer’s normal checkout.