Many years ago, I was at a friend's house and decided to quickly pop downstairs to buy something.
When trying to re-enter the building, the main gate had locked. And since my phone, keys, and any spare cash were all left upstairs, I was stuck outside.
Thankfully, Google, at the time, allowed users to send SMSes (SMSs?) through the Hangouts app, which I did after logging into my account from an internet cafe. (Back then people weren’t constantly connected to Facebook, etc.)
Since that day I feared being locked out of my accounts by 2FA, simply because my phone (and my access codes) weren't with me.
And while it's true that today people are always connected to messaging apps, I wouldn't be able to reach any of them without me being able to log into mine.
That’s why I built life_link, an app that allows my loved ones to reach me, wherever they are, without having to care about 2FA or even needing to log in. To do so, they simply need to reach the app on a secret (short) URL.
I've since expanded life_link by creating a "generator" app that can produce a pre-configured, single-file application, ready to be deployed on any static site hosting service and decided to open-source it for other people who might find it useful.
You can find the life_link project and learn more about it here: