In today’s day and age, we store all our information online and have created a digital existence and digital universe for us to live within. With just a click of a button, we can access all our personal information such as logging into social media accounts, who we know, what we do, our banking and financial details, etc. However, the more we begin to digitalize our lives, the more the risks increase.
If your password is not secure enough, it can be easily hacked. This gives way to ransomware and other processes such as ransomware removal and ransomware recovery. Further, it means that you would then have to seek assistance from cybersecurity services, which in many cases is not available to the masses.
To provide you with secure logins, social platforms and other websites are now making use of two-factor authentication to provide extra security to your data online. Two-factor authentication is a security technique which verifies your identity through two processes. To simplify this, it requires you to provide something you know, and you must have. For example, your user name, password, or pin is the thing you need to know while your mobile phone or any such device is the thing you need to have. This will ensure that your data is comparatively more secure and protected from malicious hands of a hacker.
How Two-Factor Authentication Works:
The way two-factor authentication works is that firstly, a website will require you to enter your password or pin and your user name on their site. For example, when you log into Uber, you need to insert your login credentials. Then, they ask for your phone number, which serves as the second layer of security for your personal data. Upon confirming your login credentials, you will receive a text on your phone with a four-digit pin code that you will have to enter into the application to continue using it. This proves that you know something which is your password and user name, but you also have something which is your mobile phone.
A few websites/platforms that offer two-factor authentication include:
- SnapChat
- Most banking websites
- Apple
- Yahoo
And many more.
Why Should You Use Two Factor Authentication?
Two-factor authentication is essential to use because it protects your digital existence. By having two-factor authentication on cloud platforms such as Dropbox, Google or iCloud, you can save and secure all your data such as photos, memories, workplace secrets, contacts, calendar, emails and many more aspects of your digital life. If a hacker were to get access to this data, they could do severe damage to you.
Two actor authentication might take a couple of seconds more to log in, but it’s always better to be safe than sorry by not using modern-day security features. At all times, your utmost priority should be to protect your digital existence, and whether that is through using two-factor authentication of not, that’s entirely your call, but it’s always advised to use updated security tools and features.