Best option for social media logins?

Question

I need to implement social login for my app, facebook, twitter, google etc.
What is the best option?

So far I was considering:

• CrossGeeks plugins, such as this one: https://github.com/CrossGeeks/FacebookClientPlugin
• Xamarin.Auth and OAuth2Authenticator
• Xamarin Essentials WebAuthenticator: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/xamarin/essentials/web-authenticator

I have a aspnet.core backend which i have full control of.

The CrossGeeks plugins seem very easy to use, but I am not sure they are totally still maintained or not.

Which one is the recommended way these days? And if you know, what are the pros and cons of each? Thanks!

Answer 1

Hello,

Welcome to our Microsoft Q&A platform!

Many apps require adding user authentication. This often means enabling users to sign into existing Microsoft, Facebook, Google, and (now) Apple Sign-In accounts.

Microsoft Authentication Library (MSAL) provides an excellent turn-key solution to adding authentication to your app. Additionally, there is even support for Xamarin apps in their client NuGet package.

If you're interested in using your own web service for authentication, it's possible to use WebAuthenticator to implement the client side functionality.

Many authentication providers have moved to only offering explicit or two-legged authentication flows to ensure better security. This means you'll need a 'client secret' from the provider to complete the authentication flow. Unfortunately, mobile apps are not a great place to store secrets and anything stored in a mobile app's code, binaries, or otherwise is generally considered to be insecure.

The best practice here is to use a web backend as a middle layer between your mobile app and the authentication provider.

Just as the official document Xamarin.Essentials: Web Authenticator mentioned:

So, if you are looking for a way to easily integrate Xamarin social authentication into a new or existing ASP.NET (or other) web app, Xamarin.Essentials Web Authenticator is what you want.

For more details, you can check documents:
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/xamarin/essentials/web-authenticator?tabs=android
https://devblogs.microsoft.com/xamarin/authentication-xamarin-essentials-aspnet/

Best Regards,

Jessie Zhang

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