SMS: Texting numeric strings is the best holiday gift to cyberthieves

For years, enterprise IT and security operations have been told they need to advance beyond texting short numeric strings in plain text and calling it meaningful Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) or even just Two-Factor Authentication (2FA). It is stunning how many enterprises still cling to that entry-level security sham, even knowing how subject it is to man-in-the-middle attacks.

As for the oft-cited defense that, “it’s better than having no MFA at all,” I am not so sure. It provides false comfort to enterprise users that they have meaningful security. That prevents companies from quickly deploying truly robust security, such as an MFA that uses several authentication layers, including voice-recognition, facial- or finger-ID courtesy of the ubiquitous smartphone and almost any of the mobile encrypted authentication apps. (Don’t forget that Signal can work well, too.)

To read this article in full, please click here