Password Reset via SSH

Problem to solve

Resetting the account password using SSH key in cases where the email address was forgotten.

Further details

Support gets many requests from users who are unable to login to their account because they have forgotten the password and the email address that was used for the account. If the user has added an SSH key to their account and have the private key locally, this feature would allow them to trigger a password reset email going out.

Proposal

When users loose their 2FA recovery codes, they are able to recover them using ssh - this feature would add a similar functionality for a password reset.

What does success look like, and how can we measure that?

Users are better able to recover their password. We can measure this based on reduced ticket numbers for GitLab.com where users ask us to help with account recovery as well as reduction in cases where support is unable to assist at all.

Links / references

Internal Slack Discussion