Two-factor authentication may not be as sexy as the iPhone 5, but the technology is capturing news headlines, and deservedly so. Last week, Microsoft began rolling out this security tool for its some 700 million Microsoft Account users. Tuesday Wired reported Twitter is working on two-factor authentication as well.
It's a security feature that could have stopped hackers at the gate before they seized control of the Associated Press Twitter account, and it's something you should be using to protect your own online accounts, wherever it's available.
So how does two-factor authentication work? In a nutshell, it requires not one but two pieces of privileged information before granting access to an online account.
Let's say you've already set up two-factor authentication for your Google account, and now a hacker halfway around the world is trying to break into your Gmail. He has your email address and even your password, but he doesn't have the second element of the authentication process. In the case of Google accounts, the second element is a unique security code that's sent directly to your cell phone via text messaging.
In essence, two-factor authentication requires something you've committed to memory (your password) and something you have in your pocket (your phone).
If two-factor authentication sounds like kind of a pain, well, it is. Turning on this feature is a really easy way to make life harder for yourself, as you’ll need to spend extra time to prove your identity every time you log into a protected account from a new piece of hardware. Nonetheless, this level of authentication makes it much harder for hackers to seize control of your accounts.
