We are just over one month away from what is looking to be the start of another huge year in biometrics, but that doesn’t mean we’re done with 2014 releases in strong authentication. According to an article from PC World, the senior vice president and general manager of Intel’s PC Client Group, Kirk Skaugen, said that new McAfee software will be available before the end of 2014 that will allow users to use biometrics to log into Windows.
The announcement came last week and details are still surfacing about how this biometric software will manifest in terms of user experience and modality. That said, one thing that we can be sure of is that the biometric solution will aim to solve the end user password problem.
In logical access control for computers and online accounts a major vulnerability has been the heavy demands placed on end users when it comes to proper security practices. Skaugen is reported as having used the statistic that the average user has approximately 18 passwords. Using that number it’s easy to see the need for an alternative: ideally, each of those 18 passwords is unique, regularly changed, of sufficient complexity and not saved in a document on a user’s device.
With the coming solution, Skaugen is hopeful that starting with the Windows login screen, PC users will be able to start to say goodbye to passwords forever very soon.
The near impossibility of proper password management by the public at large is well documented and often comical. Every few years a new study emerges with the most popular passwords in America, a constant fixture of which are the very popular passcodes “12345678” and my personal favorite, “password”.
—
November 25, 2014 by Peter B. Counter
Follow Us