Retailers could be shutting down revenue streams due to poor shopping sign-up processes, a study from a passwordless multi-factor authentication (MFA) provider suggests. A survey of more than 1,000 people in the UK found that 62pc of respondents have abandoned a shopping cart if they are required to create an account.
After abandoning a cart, most, 83pc of British people would seek a competitor’s services, 76pc say that they would be reluctant to visit the same retail website again and 58% would have a negative perception of the brand.
British respondents were asked to select three of the most “annoying” parts of online login and registration. One-third (38pc) of respondents said forgetting passwords annoyed them the most, 39pc said password that had specific requirements (length, special characters, and so forth) and a further 38pc said CAPTCHA tests were the most irritating part of logins. A further 27pc said security questions were annoying and 20pc said the same about MFA.
Respondents were also asked about what stopped them completing a purchase. About one third (32pc) blamed “fatigue from constantly creating online accounts”, while 41pc reported abandoning a cart because they had forgotten a password and 30% said over-complex password creation requirements were deal-breakers at the checkout.
One quarter (25pc) said passing a CAPTCHA test stopped them finishing a purchase, while 15pc blamed MFA.
Tom “TJ” Jermoluk, CEO of Beyond Identity, said: “We’ve all experienced the frustration of forgetting our passwords. Now it’s time to forget the password altogether because the results of this survey show they are becoming a liability. The online retail space is hugely competitive, so brands should be very nervous to hear that problems with passwords, account sign-ups and online registration can drive customers to abandon their carts or seek a competitor’s services”.
“The best way to solve the problems with passwords is to abolish them altogether. Gartner predicts that 60pc of large and global enterprises and 90pc of midsize enterprises will implement passwordless protections by 2022, turning to MFA and other security solutions in more than 50pc of use cases. Retailers can’t afford to lose customers, so it’s time for them to lose passwords and give their users a secure and seamless experience.”
