{"id":1977,"date":"2013-11-25T19:55:29","date_gmt":"2013-11-25T19:55:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/?p=691"},"modified":"2013-11-25T19:55:29","modified_gmt":"2013-11-25T19:55:29","slug":"why-do-we-still-use-passwords","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/why-do-we-still-use-passwords\/","title":{"rendered":"Why do we Still Use Passwords?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In a world of digital <i>everything<\/i> I have started to wonder why we still use passwords to access it all.\u00a0 Are patterns of letters and numbers really the best way to protect our most valuable data?\u00a0 From the amount of cybercrime, I would assume not.\u00a0 So we must do it because it is so dang easy\u2026 but then why are we always forgetting which password we used for what?\u00a0 Isn\u2019t it time we found a better solution?<\/p>\n<p><b>The Problem:<\/b><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>73% of all Americans have been a victim of some type of cybercrime.<\/li>\n<li>Typically there is a 156 day lapse before a compromised account is detected.<\/li>\n<li>It only takes 10 minutes to crack a 6 digit lowercase password<\/li>\n<li>Over 1 trillion dollars\u2019 worth of intellectual property is stolen every year by compromised passwords.<\/li>\n<li>Roughly 2\/3 of people use the same passwords across all their accounts<\/li>\n<li>Even when notified of a compromised password, only 8% \u00a0of people change a password immediately<\/li>\n<li>Users tend to share passwords with close friends, family, and co-workers<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The written word simply is not a secure method for protecting our most valuable data.\u00a0 Yet for some reason, it is the still the standard, and in many cases, the only option we have.\u00a0 Technology has advanced to the point that new options are becoming available.<\/p>\n<p>You may have noticed more and more websites requiring \u201ctwo-step\u201d authentication.\u00a0 This is where you are required by the site to not only use a password but also use a secondary device or system to verify your identity.\u00a0 This is typically done by forcing you to retrieve a code via a confirmed email address, text message, or automated phone call.\u00a0 Surveys show that although 40% are on board with this method, the other 60% find that two-step authentication takes too much time, doesn\u2019t work well, or is unneeded.<\/p>\n<p>Captcha\u2019s are also quite common as a control method for account protection, but typically frustrate more users than they protect.\u00a0 For a captcha to be strong enough to prevent a bot from being able to break it, it has to be quite difficult.\u00a0 So difficult that it is even difficult for the human eye to distinguish, making logging into accounts sometimes tedious and troublesome.<\/p>\n<p>The Solution:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Biometrics \u2013 It is about time we start using ourselves as our password.\u00a0 Fingerprint scanning, retinal scanning, facial recognition are all acceptable options.<\/li>\n<li>Voice Recognition \u2013 Voice recognition is certainly attainable, but may not be as secure as a finger or palm print.<\/li>\n<li>USB keys \u2013 Using a USB as a sort of \u201ckey\u201d to your computer and websites would be an interesting method of security.\u00a0 It would have to be plugged in to access your files on websites.<\/li>\n<li>Drawing\/Touch based Passwords \u2013 Like Windows 8 has down on their tablets, involving touch patterns or drawings allows any number of unique passwords that would be near impossible to guess or crack.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>So what needs to happen before we make the switch, and why haven\u2019t we already?\u00a0 One main reason, because no one trusts these other methods yet, and for good reason, they don\u2019t work all that well.\u00a0 Big players like Google, Sony, and Apple, have been absent from this market, leaving small companies to lead the way on innovation.\u00a0 The products that have come out have been <i>okay<\/i> at best, and need some serious R&amp;D before we can consider them a replacement for passwords.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In a world of digital everything I have started to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[508],"tags":[1106,392],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1977"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1977"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1977\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1977"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1977"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1977"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}