Security News > 2021 > May > Google will make you use two-step verification to login

Google has marked World Password Day by declaring "Passwords are the single biggest threat to your online security," and announcing plans to automatically add multi-step authentication to its users' accounts.

A mere eight years after Intel began promoting World Password Day as a way to raise awareness about the importance of strong passwords, Google is ready to wipe them from memory.

At the 2004 RSA Conference, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates predicted passwords would become less important in the years ahead. The Windows biz has pushed to make that happen by supporting FIDO2 security keys for authentication and switching to token-based authentication to approve git operations on GitHub, among other initiatives.

This process still involves passwords - entering your password is the first step.

Google isn't done with passwords, having built its Password Manager into Chrome, Android, and more recently iOS, and welded the code to its one-click Security Checkup, which alerts users when passwords have been publicly exposed, when they've been reused across multiple sites, and when they're too short or otherwise weak.

"One day, we hope stolen passwords will be a thing of the past, because passwords will be a thing of the past, but until then Google will continue to keep you and your passwords safe," said Risher.

News URL

https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2021/05/07/google_password_purge/