Multi-factor Authentication (MFA)

Weak and default passwords or passwords stolen through phishing and other attack methods are still being used to execute successful fraud attacks and data breaches. Confirming the identities of your employees, partners and customers through MFA thwarts attackers.

You have the option of using stronger authentication methods like mobile push authentication, QR codes and FIDO-compliant authenticators instead of credentials to enable passwordless login.

Adaptive MFA can leverage frictionless, contextual and behavioral data such as geolocation, IP address and time since last authentication in order to assess risk. Based on risk, you can add step-up authentication factors to gain a higher level of assurance about a user’s identity when warranted.

The user starts by requesting a resource and has to input their first factor of authentication which is most often a password  (but doesn’t have to be). Ping’s authentication and SSO capabilities enable you to accept stronger, more convenient methods—such as biometrics—as the first factor.

When you add MFA everywhere without making it adaptive based on the context and risk of the situation, you’re adding unnecessary friction. Instead, Ping’s MFA policies look at the context and decide whether or not a second factor is needed at all.

Based on the context and risk of the access request and resource, Ping’s MFA service either approves the low-risk access request right away or it sends a second factor request to the user. It will do this before sending the higher-risk access approval back to the authentication authority.