Every week while I am reviewing the infosec news I read about more and bigger compromises of user account information. If users themselves are not falling for phishing attacks and entering their user name and passwords into bogus webpages, then their user name and passwords are being compromised when some company database gets hacked. The danger becomes much greater when we consider that most of us use just a few different passwords for all of our accounts. Savvy hackers could take advantage of this and clean you out before you even realized that your secrets had been compromised.
The easiest and most effective way that you personally can help protect yourself in this horrible online environment is to implement multi-factor authentication (MFA) for everything you access. This includes email, online banking, social media, online shopping and everything else that you can think of. And, believe me, I know what a pain it can be to always be hassling with MFA mechanisms! You often have to get a code from another device or carry a dongle with you. It takes time, and you keep having to do it over and over again. It gets old very quickly.
But wait! There are more problems involved than just the hassle of using MFA. Once you have implemented it, you also have to worry about being locked out of your account. Say for example you are trying to get a code to enter into your laptop but your phone is dead or out of range. You are left high and dry. Having at least two options for authentication can help you here.
Another thing to consider is the danger of using SMS for sending MFA authentication codes. The main weakness here is depending on the cell phone ..
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