- From: Chris Drake <christopher@pobox.com>
- Date: Tue, 13 Jun 2006 00:52:59 +1000
- To: public-usable-authentication@w3.org
There's another aspect to this security problem that it conspicuous by it's obvious absence - people have multiple logins everywhere - most people using the same password on all of them. Phishers don't need to hack or spoof PayPal to steal peoples money - they just need to hack or spoof anywhere else victims frequent, or even run any site that asks them to legitimately create an account (eg: blogs, software/movie/mp3 download sites, whatever) - chances are the victim will give their PayPal credentials that way anyhow. We don't just have to protect victims against malicious phishing attacks etc - we also have to protect them against their own stupidity. And "stupidity" isn't obvious - I listened to my dad telling the phone company his date of birth when they phoned his cell to offer him some telco reward scheme - after he finished the call, I told him it could have been anyone phoning him - not just the phone company - and I said he was stupid to tell them his birthday. Besides the fact he volunteered the info without question, he did not agree with me that it was stupid to tell them. I bet he'd probably have told them his PIN number after they offered whatever discount sounded good, and I know his PIN is the same on his phone, email account, and home alarm for sure - I bet it's probably the same on his ATM cards too. A *really* **good** authentication scheme not only solves the relying-party-must-authenticate-to-user problem, but ALSO solves the stupid user problem too. Kind Regards, Chris Drake
Received on Monday, 12 June 2006 14:53:06 UTC