Comment Added by : Joe Bloggs

Comment Added at : 2013-04-22 13:40:24

Comment on Tutorial : Pros and Cons of 2FA / Two-Factor Authentication By Bruce Schneier
All true, but the 2FA that has been implemented for some years by my bank (Barclays) requires transaction details (e.g. amount and destination account number) to be keyed into the authentication token (which has its own keypad) and the signed response to be keyed into the website.

The token uses the crypto module on my bank card's chip, so is a relatively cheap device interchangeable which is between all of the bank's customers.

This mitigates against both trojans and MITM as it prevents the attacker from performing any malicious activity once logged in without somehow getting me to enter their chosen amount and account number into the signing device (albeit they can still view my account statements, which may also be undesirable).

I'm pretty sure that Barclays are not the only bank in the UK to adopt this approach, and would be surprised if other countries had not also followed suit. Of course, the US are still to adopt chips on bank cards, so are many years behind the rest of the world on this one.

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