A developer is reviving BrowserID, a decade-old authentication protocol, to solve a modern problem: managing users for small, personal apps without relying on corporate identity providers. The project, called WKID (Wakamoleguy's Identity server), targets the growing trend of solo developers building bespoke apps for themselves, friends, and family using LLMs.

The motivation stems from wanting to avoid repeatedly rebuilding auth systems or depending on Google, Auth0, or similar services that could suspend accounts. BrowserID fits because it's federated by email domain (the developer controls their own), maintains privacy (the IdP doesn't see what sites users log into), and uses email addresses directly as identifiers. It's also lightweight for apps to implement, with no need to register each service with the identity provider.

Mozilla's original BrowserID failed in 2016 due to a chicken-and-egg problem—identity providers wouldn't join without relying parties, and vice versa. WKID sidesteps this by moving the goalposts: it's not targeting global adoption but rather a handful of personal hobby projects. The developer isn't planning fallback IdP functionality or support for major email providers, since the target users are just themselves and family with emails on their own domains. End-to-end flows are functional, though the project needs styling polish and documentation before sharing.

WKID is currently in development, with end-to-end authentication flows tested and working. The developer invites others working on authentication services to reach out if they want to try it with their own projects.