As Bill Gates said, passwords will soon die out – but that was a dozen years ago, as Dr Jessica Barker , pictured, reminded the Today programme on BBC Radio 4 on Tuesday, August 2.
As she stressed to the programme, passwords are ‘the least worst alternative’, and have been for a long time, ‘although there are many issues with passwords; people struggle to remember them, we all have many accounts, people aren’t comfortable with password managers in general,or they struggle to get their heads around using password managers.”
As for voice recognition – and as recently reported, the bank Barclays is to join others in using voice recognition for its telephone banking service – she said that there have been great advances with use of biometrics, ‘but the problem with biometrics is, if I lose my password, I can change my password; if I lose my fingerprint data, or voice, or they are compromised, that’s unique and can’t change.”
When asked which product are better for us against hackers – is it the traditional password, or some biometric such as voice, iris or retina – she replied first with the reminder that there’s no such thing as 100 per cent security. “It’s about doing the thing that protects us the most and it’s also about likelihood and impact.” If passwords are stolen, we can change them; not so our fingers; and she gave a US federal example of millions of stolen fingerprints (last year, from the Office of Personnel Management). “And that’s a scary thought.” What would she do, if given the choice, passwords or biometrics?! “I would use a complicated password, password managers which aren’t as difficult as you might think; and two-factor authentication,” for example of accounts, which however most people do not use, although she described it as easier than its name might sound.
The Risk Avengers have launched their new consultancy. They are Dr Jessica Barker, Sharon Conheady and Toni Sless. More on this link: https://professionalsecurity.co.uk/news/interviews/trio-launch/.
