If you have a Gmail account for a Google account, then soon Google might ask you for a two-step verification adding an extra layer of security for the users and their credentials. These security measures are aimed to reduce the exponentially increasing phishing and data breach.
Google has been encouraging its users to enable two-step verification, also known as two-factor authentication, for better safety of their credentials.
For now,Google is asking its 2 billion Gmail users to enrol in two-step authentication process, but soon, they will start enrolling users automatically.
“Soon we’ll start automatically enrolling users in 2SV if their accounts are appropriately configured. (You can check the status of your account in our Security Check-up),” Mark Risher, the director of product management in Google’s Identity and User Security group said.
“You may not realize it, but passwords are the single biggest threat to your online security – they’re easy to steal, they’re hard to remember, and managing them is tedious,” he says.
The second step factor will ensure that even if someone gets a hold of your account, they won’t be able to do anything because it will ask for a one-time password that only the user will receive, thus providing an extra layer of security.
Google has been working on its 2SV for a while now and it doesn’t bother the users much to use. Now if a user is enrolled for 2SV and changes account or logs in to his account on a new device, the account will ask for an OTP, which the user will receive via SMS to their phone.
“Using their mobile device to sign in gives people a safer and more secure authentication experience than passwords alone,” notes Risher.
Passwords are still in use abundantly after Microsoft’s co-founder Bill Gates predicted 17 years ago that they will soon be irrelevant. Since then, the number of usernames and passwords have only increased overtime, but the introduction of the 2SV system has ensured better safety and reliability to the users.
