A future without passwords

The biggest threat to security in our digital world is the password. According to the Verizon 2020 Data Breach Investigations Report, over 80% of breaches involve lost or stolen credentials. The move to remote work during Covid-19 has further increased the security risk around passwords by expanding the attack surface for cyber criminals.

If you stop and think about it, it’s hard to explain why we have to remember an arbitrary series of numbers, letters, and characters for every single account we access, especially in today’s modern world. Passwords are a relic of 1.0 tech. They have remained essentially unchanged for the last 30 years while continuing to serve as the frontline method to manage access. As our lives have become increasingly digital, users are forced to remember and update multiple credentials. I have more than thirty accounts that I use on a regular basis. It is paradoxical that the tool intended to be the gatekeeper to sensitive information is in fact the weakest link in the chain at protecting and preventing unpermitted access to data, and is at the same time the reason for one for one of the most unpleasant user flows in technology.

At Advent, we have been focused on the problem of authentication for years, and have spent considerable time evaluating companies across the identity and access management market. While there are a number of interesting solutions out there, they fundamentally are built on passwords. Despite the billions of dollars spent on MFA and other authentication technologies, users still fall victim to compromise from social engineering, credential reuse, MFA bypass, and other constantly evolving attack methods. For a large part of the world, we believe the answer is to move past the password and eliminate this exposure.

When we discovered HYPR, we found a team that was passionate about delivering passwordless solutions to the market at scale.

It is elegant in its simplicity, utilizing familiar open standards such as FIDO and public-key encryption combined with a mobile-initiated user experience that is unique to HYPR. Best of all, it makes for a delightful user experience for employees and customers that is significantly faster than password-based MFA.

HYPR’s customers, which include some of the largest financial institutions, told us stories of spending tens of millions of dollars across multiple technologies to try and protect the password, until they found HYPR. They spoke of a terrific founding team, led by George, Bojan, and Roman that is relentlessly focused on building great product and delivering for their customers.

When we imagine the future, passwords have been relegated to their appropriate place in the 1.0 tech history book. HYPR is helping to make this a reality, and we’re thrilled to partner with them to help them achieve their ultimate goal of eliminating the password.