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dim13
otpauth
Go2021–2023
dim13 / otpauth

otpauth

Google Authenticator migration decoder

Explore on GitHubRead Hacker News discussions
3Distinct people
5Mentions
0Explicit recommenders
972GitHub stars
REPOSITORY AT A GLANCE

What to know before exploring

What it is

Google Authenticator migration decoder

GitHub

Where it is used

No documented product use has been verified yet.

What people are saying

No recommendation phrase was found in the indexed comments.

No classified warning is attached to this page. Read the discussions before treating silence as approval.

Also in these discussions

No other repository is repeatedly linked in the same discussions.

This week on Hacker News

Nov 7–Nov 14 UTC · Direct repository links and separately labeled related project stories. Indexed through 11/14/2026, 3:56:07 PM UTC.

No direct repository links were found in the indexed HN discussions over the past seven days. Older discussions are available below.

Mentions over time

HN mentions by month5 dated mentions

Observed mentions: 2021-03-02 11:44:17 UTC to 2023-04-24 19:17:01 UTC.

0122021-03-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2021-04-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 1 submissions, 0 commentsMar 20212021-04-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2021-05-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2021-05-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2021-06-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2021-06-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2021-07-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2021-07-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2021-08-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2021-08-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2021-09-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2021-09-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2021-10-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 1 submissions, 0 comments2021-10-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2021-11-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2021-11-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2021-12-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2021-12-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2022-02-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2022-02-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2022-03-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2022-03-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2022-04-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 commentsMar 20222022-04-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2022-05-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2022-05-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2022-06-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2022-06-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2022-07-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2022-07-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2022-08-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2022-08-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2022-09-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2022-09-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2022-10-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2022-10-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2022-11-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2022-11-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2022-12-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2022-12-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2023-02-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2023-02-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2023-03-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2023-03-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2023-04-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 2 mentions; 0 submissions, 2 comments2023-04-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2023-05-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 commentsApr 2023

Counts come from the repository’s dated source evidence. Index cutoff: 2026-11-02 08:16:59 UTC.

View mention counts and date ranges
UTC ranges include their start and exclude their end. Select a period to filter the source evidence.
PeriodStart (UTC)End (exclusive, UTC)MentionsSubmissionsComments
Mar 20212021-03-01 00:00:00 UTC2021-04-01 00:00:00 UTC110
Apr 20212021-04-01 00:00:00 UTC2021-05-01 00:00:00 UTC000
May 20212021-05-01 00:00:00 UTC2021-06-01 00:00:00 UTC000
Jun 20212021-06-01 00:00:00 UTC2021-07-01 00:00:00 UTC000
Jul 20212021-07-01 00:00:00 UTC2021-08-01 00:00:00 UTC000
Aug 20212021-08-01 00:00:00 UTC2021-09-01 00:00:00 UTC000
Sep 20212021-09-01 00:00:00 UTC2021-10-01 00:00:00 UTC110
Oct 20212021-10-01 00:00:00 UTC2021-11-01 00:00:00 UTC000
Nov 20212021-11-01 00:00:00 UTC2021-12-01 00:00:00 UTC000
Dec 20212021-12-01 00:00:00 UTC2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC000
Jan 20222022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2022-02-01 00:00:00 UTC000
Feb 20222022-02-01 00:00:00 UTC2022-03-01 00:00:00 UTC000
Mar 20222022-03-01 00:00:00 UTC2022-04-01 00:00:00 UTC000
Apr 20222022-04-01 00:00:00 UTC2022-05-01 00:00:00 UTC000
May 20222022-05-01 00:00:00 UTC2022-06-01 00:00:00 UTC000
Jun 20222022-06-01 00:00:00 UTC2022-07-01 00:00:00 UTC000
Jul 20222022-07-01 00:00:00 UTC2022-08-01 00:00:00 UTC000
Aug 20222022-08-01 00:00:00 UTC2022-09-01 00:00:00 UTC000
Sep 20222022-09-01 00:00:00 UTC2022-10-01 00:00:00 UTC000
Oct 20222022-10-01 00:00:00 UTC2022-11-01 00:00:00 UTC000
Nov 20222022-11-01 00:00:00 UTC2022-12-01 00:00:00 UTC000
Dec 20222022-12-01 00:00:00 UTC2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC000
Jan 20232023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2023-02-01 00:00:00 UTC000
Feb 20232023-02-01 00:00:00 UTC2023-03-01 00:00:00 UTC000
Mar 20232023-03-01 00:00:00 UTC2023-04-01 00:00:00 UTC202
Apr 20232023-04-01 00:00:00 UTC2023-05-01 00:00:00 UTC101

What Hacker News says

5 sources
tzs·Apr 24, 2023
Note that there are two kinds of backups possible for TOTP secrets: 1. Backups that are specific to the app that made them. They can be used to restore the secrets to that same app on a new or replacement device, but might not help if you want to migrate to a different app. 2. Backups that can be restored to other apps. If you aren't sure you are going to stick with the same TOTP app long term this could be important. Sometimes there are third party tools that can take #1 type backups and give you back the secrets in a form suitable for other apps. For example, Google Authenticator can export the secrets in the form of a QR code that contains the secrets for multiple account. Another instance of Google Authenticator can read that, but other TOTP apps might not be able to. But this tool [1] knows how to take the information in that QR code
Read the rest
and decode it and split it into the individual secrets for each site. It can even generate QR codes of those for scanning into another TOTP app. If you want #2 type backups that just work with most TOTP apps, there is a fairly easy way to get them. Whenever you set up a new account and a site gives you a QR code, simply take a screenshot before using that QR code to finish setting up the new account. Store your collection of QR code screenshots somewhere safe. If you ever want to migrate to a new TOTP app or to the same app on a new device open those saved screenshots and scan the codes. If you've got an image display program that will let you open many at once restoring can be pretty fast. On my Mac for example I just do "open *.png" in the place I have the screenshots. That opens them all in Preview, with each one being a separate page. Then I tell preview to show one page at a time. Then it is a matter of scanning one, hitting "page down" on the keyboard, and repeating until they are done. After two or three I'm in the groove and it goes pretty fast. [1] https://github.com/dim13/otpauth
In Google Authenticator now supports Google Account synchronization
tzs·Mar 11, 2023
Authenticator can be backed up locally by using the same mechanism they use for migrating to a new device. That mechanism gives you a QR code containing the account information for one or more accounts, which you scan on the new device in Authenticator to import those accounts. Repeat until all accounts are migrated. I'm not sure how many accounts they can put in one QR code (I've only used Authenticator briefly to help someone else figure something out, and only put in 4 codes), but I'd expect at least 20. To make a local backup just use the migration mechanism but instead of scanning the QR codes on a new device save them somewhere. On Apple devices you should be able to simply screenshot the migration QR codes. I've heard that on Android Authenticator blocks screenshots. The contents of the QR codes are base64 encoded Google protocol b
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uffers. If you extract the contents of the QR code, you can use the command line tool otpauth [1] to extract the TOTP setup URLs for each of the sites in the Google migration code. You can have otpauth turn those individual site setup URLs into QR code images. This will do the trick: otpauth -qr --link <text_from_google_QR_code> That will leave one PNG file per account, named after the account, in the current directory. You can use those PNG files to setup those accounts on any other TOTP app that can scan QR codes. [1] https://github.com/dim13/otpauth
In How to Live Without Google: Alternatives That Protect Your Privacy
tzs·Mar 9, 2023
Maybe take a photo with the new device of the small screened old device displaying the QR code and zoom that photo, and then move the zoomed photo to somewhere that the new device's camera can try to scan it? If you can get a copy of that QR code off of the small device using the photo trick, besides using it to import your accounts to Google Authenticator (GA) on your new device you might consider extracting the codes from the backup so you can store them someplace secure separately. That way you can use them to set up TOTP apps other than GA. Here's how you could do that. First, you need to get the QR code from GA to something that can read the QR code and display its contents. The text in the GA code is otpauth-migration://offline?data=... where the ... part is apparently a base64 encoded Google protocol buffer. Once you've got that ot
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pauth-migration URL this program that showed up when searching for information on those URLs can help: otpauth [1]. otpauth --link otpauth-migration://offline?data=... will decode it and give you the otpauth://totp URLs that were in the original QR codes that you originally set up your accounts with. otpauth -qr --link otpauth-migration://offline?data=... will generate a PNG file for each account, name after the account name and site name, and containing the QR code for the account. Going forward, save those PNGs somewhere secure (I use an encrypted tar file). Any new accounts you set up save the QR codes for those as PNGs and add them to your collection. If you keep that collection up to date you will be able to readily handle any device updates or replacements readily or adding new TOTP apps. [1] https://github.com/dim13/otpauth
In Ask HN: How do you start over with 2FA after losing your phone?

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