Take Control of Your Passwords (1.1) SAMPLE

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Appendix A: Use Two-factor Authentication Earlier, in Multi-factor Authentication and Manage Email Options, I mentioned that some companies enable (or require) you to use a combination of factors—things you know, things you have, and things you are—to prove your identity. In the most common implementation, one factor is your password (a thing you know) and the other is some sort of object (a thing you have). Given the option, should you use two-factor authentication? I’ll discuss the pros and cons—and offer some notes on using Google’s and Apple’s versions of two-factor authentication. Two-factor Pros and Cons Here is a complete list of pros to using two-factor authentication: • Greater security. Seriously, that’s the whole point—there’s nothing more to say. How much greater the security is depends on which two factors are involved, but on average, it’s safe to say that you massively decrease your risks with each added factor. What about the cons? Try these: • Human fragility: You might have to carry an object with you (a token, smart card, cell phone, etc.) and if you lose or break that object, you won’t be able to log in. Similarly, if you use a biometric factor (voice recognition, say), an injury or illness can trip you up. • Technological fragility: The additional hardware used for second factors (smart-card readers, fingerprint scanners, and so on) can malfunction or be thrown off by environmental anomalies—again, preventing you from logging in. 90 Click here to buy the full 103-page “Take Control of Your Passwords” for only $10!
• Inconvenience: Two-factor authentication almost always involves something extra for you to do. Even if it’s a simple tap, swipe, scan, or whatever, it forces you to do more work every time you log in. Note: Some forms of biometrics try to overcome the inconvenience problem in clever ways. For example, a system might watch the way you type to discover distinctive patterns in the speed with which you enter certain combinations of characters. That way, without doing anything other than typing your password, you add a “what you are” factor. The question is whether the pro outweighs the cons, but the answer is different for everyone. My bank uses secure tokens—in this case, keychain-sized devices that display a new six-digit number every 30 seconds. When I want to perform certain kinds of transactions, I have to log in normally with my username and password and then enter the number currently shown on my token’s screen as a second (“what I have”) factor. It’s a small hassle, but I do few enough of those transactions that I don’t mind the extra effort—and I do appreciate the fact that no one could steal my credentials, log in to my bank account and, for example, do a large wire transfer. Google’s two-step verification (discussed just ahead) works similarly except that instead of using a secure token, it sends a six-digit code to your cell phone via SMS every time you try to log in; you enter that code after your credentials to complete the process. Although there are ways to reduce the number of times this process happens, some users have found it sufficiently aggravating to repeatedly perform that extra step that they’ve given up and gone back to standard authentication. My suggestion is to try two-factor authentication in situations where it’s offered—as long as there’s a path to return to one-factor authentication (as there is with Google). Use it for a while and see if you get used to the extra steps. If you feel you can live with them, bask in your extra security. If not, go back to the old way. 91 Click here to buy the full 103-page “Take Control of Your Passwords” for only $10!
Page 1 and 2: EBOOK EXTRAS: v1.1 Downloads, Updat
Page 3 and 4: Keep Your Passwords Secure ........
Page 5 and 6: Basics Here are a few basic concept
Page 7 and 8: Introduction Think of a card, any c
Page 9 and 10: My goal in this book is to lay out
Page 11 and 12: Passwords Quick Start To get the mo
Page 13 and 14: So, your goal when selecting any ne
Page 15 and 16: Creating memorable but unguessable
Page 17 and 18: Figure Out Which Passwords You Must
Page 19 and 20: essentially encrypted databases wit
Page 21: passwords, but if you do, you’d b
Page 25 and 26: • Even without a password manager
Page 27 and 28: About This Book Thank you for purch
Page 29 and 30: About the Publisher Publishers Adam
Page 31: Featured Titles Click any book titl

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