Businesses have relied on passwords as the first line of defense against cyber criminals for decades, so it makes sense that hackers would target credentials to gain unauthorized access to business data. With 61% of data breaches attributed to exploited credentials, many businesses use more secure authentication methods to protect their sensitive data.
The benefits of passwordless authentication far outweigh the challenges. More businesses are catching on to this trend yearly, and the passwordless authentication market is forecast to exceed $53 billion by 2030. We're looking to the future without passwords as businesses face the challenge of increasingly sophisticated cybercrime.
In This Article
- What Is Passwordless Authentication and How Does It Work?
- Why Are More Companies Going Passwordless?
- Is Passwordless Authentication More Secure?
- Passwordless Authentication Methods
- The Future Without Passwords
- Harness the Benefits of Bravura OneAuth Today
What Is Passwordless Authentication and How Does It Work?
Any authentication method that doesn't require a password falls under passwordless authentication. Typical authentication relies on one or more of the following three elements:
- What you know: Anything knowledge-based, such as complex passwords or PINs.
- What you have: Mobile devices, Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) chips and tokens.
- What you are: Your unique physiological and behavioral traits, such as fingerprints, iris or retina scans, and even your gait or how you use your keyboard.
Passwordless authentication eliminates the first element — instead of relying on knowledge-based factors to authenticate users, it depends on other methods to verify your identity.
Why Are More Companies Going Passwordless?
Legacy password-based options have been the gold standard for security for many years. Still, as cybercriminals change their approach, they have become less effective. Many businesses feel they need to elevate their cybersecurity efforts and that passwordless security gives them effective cybersecurity and a more efficient user experience.
Passwordless technology is a trend that businesses are invested in exploring, with 85% of cybersecurity professionals agreeing that adopting passwordless security is among their top five strategic initiatives. Those who have adopted passwordless technology are pleased with the result, with 57% stating it positively affects user experience and 63% reporting a positive cybersecurity impact.
The Benefits of Passwordless Authentication
There are excellent reasons for the above statistics. Passwordless authentication has many significant benefits for businesses, some of which include the following:
- Increasing security: Protecting your employees, customers and sensitive data is the primary objective of any security measure. Eliminating passwords from the authentication process gives your business a high cybersecurity posture. It mitigates a breach's financial and reputational damage.
- Preventing phishing attempts: The frequency of phishing attacks is increasing and becoming more challenging to detect. Passwordless authentication systems prevent many active phishing attacks by removing the threat of credential-based breaches.
- Improving user experience: Entering a password several times a day can be frustrating and impact productivity. Passwordless options make authentication more convenient for employees. A streamlined user experience makes for a more productive workforce.
- Reducing the strain on IT departments: Resetting passwords frustrates users and puts excess pressure on your IT department. Passwordless security frees your IT department from password resets to focus on more meaningful work.
- Ensuring compliance: Data breaches can result in considerable regulatory fines. Insurance companies are demanding the most robust data protection. Passwordless security is an excellent defense against hacking attempts, which helps your business stay compliant.
- Reducing long-term costs: Password management and storage is a costly business. When you combine these processes with the hours and expense of constant resets, your password support costs are substantial. Although going passwordless requires an upfront investment, it's less expensive in the long term.
Is Passwordless Authentication More Secure?
The simple answer is yes. Passwordless authentication is more secure than legacy authentication. As noted previously, credentials are responsible for more than half of cyber breaches. Hacking passwords is the simplest — and often most successful — method for hackers to breach complex systems. Human beings make mistakes. We write our passwords down, leave them in easy-to-find locations, reuse the same passwords or fall prey to phishing attempts.
While no authentication method is impervious to hacking, passwordless authentication is harder to crack and significantly less susceptible to breaches. Passwordless authentication removes the target of many leaks and breaches — the password itself.
Removing long and complex passwords from authentication practices eliminates all credential-based attacks, which is automatically half. It simultaneously makes the login process simpler for authorized employees and more complicated for hackers. Bypassing passwordless security requires cybercriminals to invest a lot more time and money, thus acting as a deterrent.
Passwordless Authentication Methods
If you're not using passwords, you need other secure authorization methods to verify your team's identities. Some typical passwordless authentication methods include the following:
- Possession factors: Users can unlock their accounts with something they possess, like a mobile authenticator app or a hardware token.
- Biometric factors: Your passwordless system might use physical characteristics to confirm user identities, such as a fingerprint or retina scanner. Behavioral biometrics even uses behavioral traits to verify your identity, such as how you walk or type on your keyboard.
- Magic links: You can have a system that sends users magic links to access their accounts via SMS or email.
None of these methods rely on users inputting information, meaning there is no information for hackers to steal. For best results, your passwordless solution should form part of a comprehensive security fabric consisting of multiple integrated security solutions, such as the Bravura Security Fabric.
The Future Without Passwords
Passwordless authentication reduces security costs, requires less support and enhances your overall cybersecurity profile. The improved user experience and an extra protection layer will impact how businesses choose to protect their data for years to come. Going passwordless is part of many digital transformation (DX) strategies to reduce security costs and improve user-friendliness and security.
Eliminating reliance on knowledge-based credentials has many benefits for businesses. Integrating passwordless security into your IT model is becoming more accessible as technology evolves. Taking the steps toward true passwordless authentication is a decisive move to secure your data and maintain a competitive position in your industry. There is no better time to go passwordless than now.
With that said, there are challenges associated with integrating a passwordless system. Partnering with a company at the forefront of authentication and security innovations will help you make your passwordless journey seamless so that you can get excited about your more secure and user-friendly approach to safe authentication.
Harness the Benefits of Bravura OneAuth Today
Going passwordless is the future for businesses. It requires a complete shift in mindset to keep up with current technological advancements. The change can be complex, but Bravura Security Fabric can reduce the complexity via simplified, out-of-the-box workflows to make your daily authorization management hassle-free.
For true passwordless solutions, find solutions via Bravura OneAuth powered by HYPR — a simple, one-touch biometric passwordless solution to protect you against prevalent credential-based cyber breaches. With Bravura OneAuth, you can empower your workforce with a fast, simple passwordless authorization process that increases your overall security fabric with the power of one solution. Feel free to request a demo today and see firsthand how Bravura Security can transform your cybersecurity protection.
