Why do Companies use Multifactor Authentication?
Multifactor authentication (MFA) is a process where the user has to pass two or more levels of authentication to access any file.
It is becoming ever so important to have multiple levels of security in light of increasing cyber-attacks.
The possibility of cyber-breach decreases with the added layers of security. Because it becomes difficult to get through multiple authentication levels.
We will be focusing on some of the best real-life examples of multifactor authentication.
It will help you to get a better idea of how you can put multifactor authentication in place for your business.
We will be segregating these multifactor authentication examples based on standard industries.
Open Banking Limited is a non-profit, private corporation set up by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) in the UK. Its primary objective is to create industry guidelines and software standards for retail banking.
It wanted to create an Open Banking Dictionary (a whitelist of banks and third-party companies) to ensure secure inter-trading.
They needed to secure three key aspects, namely:
- Trust Framework: To confirm if the company is registered with CMA or not.
- Identity: To confirm if the individual has access.
- Dynamic Client Registration: To manage and update all the new registrations.
The company wanted to build the required framework internally first. But later went on to partner with Ping Identity Technology.
With this partnership, they built a system with Identity and Access Management (IAM), open APIs, and consent management. It also included multiple layers of security, such as email authentication, mobile authentication, and OTP to the company address.
The solution provided by the Ping Identity Technology helped Open Banking Limited to go live ahead of its proposed timeline. It also helped the bank to achieve its goal of enhancing security and maintaining transparency as well.
Busan Bank Co. Ltd is a regional bank based in South Korea. It wanted to detect and eliminate the phishing, data loss, and other prominent cyber threats at the early stages. Its aspirations to match global standards led to the implementation of RSA NetWitness MFA.
The key challenges faced by the bank were:
- enhancing security policies,
- processing threat management in real-time, and
- cataloging IT assets.
Its ultimate aim was to achieve a unique account management system that can allow the system analysts to track screen to screen applications.
But the partnership with RSA helped the bank to stop illegal use of authentication and prevent the cyber breaches.
Also Read:Â Benefits of Multifactor Authentication
Hewlett-Packard is a globally recognized and admired brand. It wanted to provide its customers with a unique user experience. It also wanted to integrate all the IoT connected devices, record storage, and provide unified identity access to millions of its users.
While it desired upon offering the perks to its users, it wanted to enhance security and increase the authenticity factors.
The key challenge HP faced was the fragmented databases and high costs associated with enhancing security at the same time.
Hence HP decided to partner with Ping Identity Technology to counter these challenges. With this partnership, HP managed to achieve all of its objectives.
Zenefits is a cloud-based human capital software provider based in San Fransico, California.
It promotes the Bring-Your-Own-Device and Work from Home policy. Even though this policy looks attractive on the outside, companies need to provide enhanced security to the devices used by its employees.
The company wanted to use the multifactor authentication method to overcome this challenge.
Hence, it decided to partner with Duo Security’s MFA solution. The association did not just help Zenefits to achieve these objectives. But it also helped the company to implement mobile device management solutions.
Multifactor Authentication Examples in Media & Communication
Etsy, a Brooklyn, New York-based company, works as a global marketplace. It provides a platform for users to sell, buy, and rate work of the artists.
The company previously used only single-factor authentication for access management to users and employees alike.
But, the recent rise in cyber-attacks led to a change in this approach. Etsy wanted to enhance its security model with the introduction of multiple levels of authentication.
In order to achieve this objective, the company decided to partner with Duo Security’s MFA solution. The association helped Etsy to develop a multi-level security solution with your smartphone instead of an often unreliable token.
It could also deploy this security enhancement across the globe and make its users, employees, and customers feel safer.
Telco Systems is a leading US-based telecommunication services company, and it ranks in the top 25 of the Fortune 500 list. The company has around 180 million customers and stores their sensitive information.
Hence it cannot depend upon a single security level. It needed to have multiple levels of authentication.
Most of its customers interact with the company in one way or another. And in order to decrease the costs and improve the security norms, the company decided to approach Ping Identity to provide the solution.
This association involved multi-layered authentication parameters and decreased the overall cost associated with data security. It also helped to smoothen the user experience.
Multifactor Authentication Example in Education
Hamilton College is one of the oldest colleges in New York State. It has more than 1500 students and employs more than 700 faculty & staff.
Its IT security team is progressive about the use of technology to secure the campus premises. It is not an easy task to secure the entire campus.
There were signs of phishing attacks on the college network and hence they decided to go for an MFA solution to eliminate these attacks.
They chose Duo security to implement the MF security standards across the campus. The MFA package included role-based access management, device health visibility, and access policies.
This collaboration has helped the college to set up the Multifactor authentication across the college and even helped to give access to alumni also.
Key Takeaways:
We have seen how multifactor authentication can help different industries such as financial services, technology, media & communication, and education with real-life multifactor authentication examples.
Also Read: The need for Multifactor authentication for Mainframe Access
