SAN DIEGO, CA--(Marketwire - October 28, 2010) - Confident Technologies, Inc. today announced the availability of its image-based authentication solution for strengthening passwords on public-facing websites and Web-based applications. Confident ImageShield™ for password strengthening is a cloud-based, multifactor authentication service that creates one-time passcodes by prompting users to correctly identify pictures from a dynamic grid of images presented during the website login. It strengthens website logins and is highly secure against keylogging malware, phishing and brute force attacks to help protect organizations and their customers from data breaches, online fraud and identity theft.

Authentication on public-facing websites remains one of the weakest links in Internet security. Most websites continue to rely on a simple username and password as the only means of authentication for logins and sensitive transactions. The problem is that most Internet users have too many passwords to remember, so they choose weak passwords that are easily compromised by hackers or they re-use the same password on multiple websites. Industry research has shown that the most common password on the Web is "123456" and that the 5,000 most common passwords are shared by 20 percent of the online population. Researchers at Georgia Tech Research Institute recently indicated that to be secure, a password should be a string of 12 random characters including upper and lowercase letters, numbers and symbols. Unfortunately, people simply cannot remember so many complex passwords, so they revert to old habits that undermine website security and increase risk of fraud. 

Confident Technologies solves the problem of poor password practices by adding a secure, one-time passcode to login credentials simply by asking users to identify images. When a user registers on a website for the first time, they choose a few categories of images that are easy to remember -- such as dogs, cars and flowers. Each time the user logs in they are presented with a randomly-generated grid of images -- the Confident ImageShield. The user looks for the images that fit their chosen categories and enters the corresponding letters or numbers that appear in the images to form a one-time passcode. The specific images, their location on the grid and the corresponding alphanumeric characters are different every time. In this way, Confident ImageShield creates a unique passcode for each authentication, yet the user only needs to remember a few simple categories -- dogs, cars and flowers, in this case.

Confident ImageShield increases website security by inserting a layer of strong authentication without the need for tokens, smart cards or biometrics; which are expensive and difficult for businesses to distribute and maintain. As a hosted authentication service, Confident ImageShield is configurable and easy to integrate with existing security processes. When added to the traditional username/password authentication process Confident ImageShield can increase the security level of a login by more than 99.999 percent. It is secure against brute force dictionary attacks, random guessing, phishing attempts, and because it creates one-time passcodes Confident ImageShield helps make logins secure against keylogging malware used to steal traditional passwords.

The human brain is innately better at remembering categories and recognizing images than remembering long strings of random alphanumeric characters. Leveraging this fact, Confident ImageShield is uniquely able to increase website security while remaining simple for users. There is no software to download, no tokens to carry, and industry research has shown that people remember graphical passwords longer and are able to authenticate correctly more often with image-based authentication methods than with alphanumeric passwords or PINs.

"Organizations no longer need to sacrifice website security for usability," said Curtis H. Staker, chief executive officer of Confident Technologies, Inc. "Using Confident ImageShield for password strengthening, organizations of all types can easily integrate strong, multi-factor authentication and one-time passcodes into their security architectures without burdening users. Passwords are outdated and ineffective. Image-based authentication is secure, easy-to-use and a modern solution to today's most pervasive website security threat -- the poor authentication practices that lead to online fraud and identity theft."

Try a demo of Confident ImageShield for password strengthening by visiting http://www.confidenttechnologies.com/demos

View a video overview of image-based authentication and how it increases security on websites by visiting http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yR9fxscuwDg.

About Confident Technologies

Confident Technologies provides image-based, multifactor authentication and verification solutions for websites, Web applications and mobile devices. Image-based authentication and mobile authentication solutions from Confident Technologies improve the user experience, increase website security, and help protect consumer and enterprise data during online transactions without the need for authentication tokens, smart cards or biometrics.

More than 50 websites and organizations rely on Confident Technologies' image-based authentication and verification solutions, including 10 organizations in the financial services industry using Confident ImageShield™ for online authentication and secure login. Additionally, thousands of individual consumers use the MyVidoop image-based, online password manager from Confident Technologies as their secure OpenID login on the Web.

For more information, visit www.confidenttechnologies.com. 

Follow Confident Technologies on Twitter: www.twitter.com/ConfidentTech.

Copyright 2010 Confident Technologies, Inc. All rights reserved.

Confident Technologies is a registered trademark of Confident Technologies, Inc. All other trademarks are property of their respective owners.