The astronomer Carl Sagan once said, “You have to know the past to understand the present.”
In a not too distant past, about 35 years ago, IBM deployed the first ATMs in Argentina. I remember that, at the time, the idea of walking up to a machine and being able to withdraw money at any time of day, using a four-digit number was such a revolution! Essentially, the ATM card and a user’s four-digit PIN were part of an encryption process underneath the pad – and this was a really good example of a deep, broad, and secure authentication mechanism that could be used to provide a fairly simple operation for a customer.
That construct of ease of use was a driving force for business but… was it scalable?
Fast-forward 35 years, the reliance on passwords has shifted from a convenience to a liability, both in terms of security and customer experience. While back then, we were all fascinated by the practicality of using an ATM to withdraw money or pay a utility bill, such fascination with technology quickly plummets as authentication processes get more and more complicated. Ironically, as we continue to add measures to “secure” our passwords, the more we introduce security risks to customers and the organizations providing the endpoint capabilities. Why is this?
Furthermore, years of successive data breaches leaked customer’s private information onto the dark web, becoming an attractive market for fraudsters. For example, NBC News reported3 not too long ago that:
So passwords and challenge questions are not only frustrating for customers – they’re ultimately insecure and vulnerable.
We can exchange knowledge, in the form of passwords, PINs, memorable data or personal details, but these verification methods come at a price, not least the loss of privacy, inconvenience, insecurity and identity fraud.
Today, fraud, risk, and customer experience experts spend a lot of time wrangling over some key questions:
The answer to these questions might just be going back to basics: to who we are and what we have, in the form of our biometric identity.
In my next article, I will go into some of the use cases for biometric authentication, and show why biometric passwords are a safer – and more logical alternative to traditional passwords.
1 Microsoft Research. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/publication/a-large-scale-study-of-web-password-habits-2/
2 Google, in collaboration with Harris. https://storage.googleapis.com/gweb-uniblog-publish-prod/documents/PasswordCheckup-HarrisPoll-InfographicFINAL.pdf
3 Dark Web Market Price Index (US Edition) by TOP10VPN
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