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Visual Passwords: Cure-All or Snake-Oil?

The article discusses the usage of visual passwords for computer security. The problems with traditional passwords are discussed, mentioning the difficulty of remembering secure passwords, the frequency with which insecure passwords are chosen due to the ease with which they are memorized, and the i...

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Published in:Communications of the ACM Vol. 52; no. 12; pp. 135 - 141
Main Authors: RENAUD, KAREN, DE ANGELI, ANTONELLA
Format: Article
Published: Association for Computing Machinery Dec2009
Subjects:
Computer security
Computer passwords
Computer access control
Authentication (Law)
Memory
Biometric identification
Security systems
Online Access:View this record in EBSCOhost
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        atl: Visual Passwords: Cure-All or Snake-Oil?
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          RENAUD, KAREN
          DE ANGELI, ANTONELLA
        affil:
          Senior lecturer, Department of Computing Science, University of Glasgow, United Kingdom.
          Lecturer, Manchester Business School, University of Manchester, UK.
      su:
        Computer security
        Computer passwords
        Computer access control
        Authentication (Law)
        Memory
        Biometric identification
        Security systems
      sug:
        subj:
          Computer security
          Computer passwords
          Computer access control
          Authentication (Law)
          Memory
          Biometric identification
          Security systems
      ab: The article discusses the usage of visual passwords for computer security. The problems with traditional passwords are discussed, mentioning the difficulty of remembering secure passwords, the frequency with which insecure passwords are chosen due to the ease with which they are memorized, and the insecure practice of writing passwords down. The four stages of digital authentication are mentioned, which include matching the user with the authentication key, challenging the user to provide the authentication key, and occasionally supplying the user with a new key if the old one is forgotten. The types of visual passwords are also discussed, which include searchmetric, locimetric, and drawmetric systems.
      pubtype: Periodical
      doctype: Article
      src: R
    language: English
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