MFA: Keep Customer Accounts Secure

If you are in the financial industry, you need trust. Your customers must trust that you will keep their information secure. They must trust that you have systems in place to prevent theft of their data. Customers trust your company to have their best interest at heart. And if that trust is lost, then you will no longer have customers. And if you don’t have customers, well…if you don’t have customers, you don’t have a company. Needless to say, trust is incredibly important.

“Trust is the lubrication that makes it possible for organizations to work.”

Warren Bennis

To keep our customers’ trust and their data safe, we need to constantly be improving the security of their data. It also doesn’t hurt to let customers know that your site is secure. One great way to do this is through multi-factor authentication (MFA).

What is MFA?

Put simply, MFA is an authentication method that requires a user to provide two or more verification factors to gain access to a resource such as an application, online account or VPN. The two verification factors must be distinct, so entering two different passwords doesn’t cut it. I’ve seen MFA applied in a number of ways as I use the Internet each day. When I log into my retirement account with my username and password, a verification code is sent to my phone that I also must enter to access my account. Or when I log into my email, I must approve the sign-in using a separate Authenticator app. I’ve also had verification codes sent to my email address.

Why Should We Use MFA?

So, why should we start providing MFA? Put simply, to increase our customers’ trust. MFA is starting to be used all over the web to help keep data more secure and make it a lot harder for an imposter to access an account. Your customers are probably a lot like me and are already using MFA in a variety of ways across multiple accounts. They might be so used to using MFA that they may start to feel a site isn’t secure if it doesn’t have it. This is not how you want customers to feel about your site.

In addition to helping your customers have more trust in your company, MFA actually makes your website more trustworthy by making it more secure. Here are some statistics from a TeleSign Consumer Account Security Report that show the importance of MFA:

• 80% of consumers are worried about their online security
• 73% of online accounts use duplicated passwords
• 54% of consumers use five or fewer passwords across their entire online life and 22% use three or fewer
• 47% of consumers use a password that hasn’t been changed for five years
• 68% of consumers want companies to provide an extra layer of security

68% means that most people want an extra layer of security, and that number is growing. MFA allows you to provide that extra layer of security. It enables you to help protect your customers’ sensitive information, making it that much harder for thieves to steal it. Plus, it very visibly conveys to your customers how hard you are working to keep their information safe. And that’s never a bad thing.

How to Start Offering MFA

If you are as convinced as I am that MFA is definitely the way to go, then you are probably wondering how you can begin to offer MFA to your customers. At GOLDPoint Systems, we’ve got you covered. MFA is offered in several of our online products, including GOLDAccount Center, eGOLDTrak, the App Portal, and our GOLDAccount Center Mobile App. If your institution already uses one of these products and wants to start offering MFA, contact your account manager and we can get you set up.

If you are new to GOLDPoint Systems and want to learn how we help our customers securely service over 55 million accounts, contact us today!