For the past few years, FNS’s passwordless blockchain-based authentication has been utilized by more than 2 million users in South Korea.
Heaptalk, Jakarta — Password dan ID was first demonstrated at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1961 and has been utilized for almost 62 years, however, this method leads to a great problem regarding password and ID theft which attacks governments, entities, organizations, and also society. The adoption of these traditional methods later become the ‘perpetuity of nightmare’.
As cited from the IBM Security 2022 report, compromised credentials and phishing become the most common initial attack vectors, with a percentage of 19% of breaches and 16% of breaches, respectively compared to other attacks. Phishing becomes the costliest breach cause, leading to $4.91 million in average breach costs for responding organizations.
In addition to great losses, these attacks also potentially harm the company’s image, making them lose important data and breaking its software and computer system. Perceiving this risk, a new innovation that replaces this traditional technology becomes a critical point.
The CEO of FNS Malaysia, Thaib Mustafa, during an exclusive interview with Heaptalk, stated, “Almost 80% to 90% of industries still use ID passwords which can be stolen. The industry needed a change, a total change”.
Thaib revealed that protecting credentials and digital identity is about secure access, one of which is by moving to passwordless.
“We need to move forward without passwords to secure authentication,” said Thaib.
He explained that users often do not realize they are being phished when they authenticate their password. By applying passwordless, this unpleasant incident can be avoided. This possibly happened as the technology requires the user’s bioprint, such as a fingerprint, to discard the use of a password.
Thaib further conveyed that FNS provides this technology, but in a unique way as the company adopts the use of a network of blockchain technology, known as Blockchain Secure Authentication (BSA).
BSA is claimed to create a service that is more secure, cost-efficient, and user-friendly. This technology can improve user experience by depriving steps to remember and input passwords and providing integrated access to all applications and services. By eliminating risky password management, this method also automatically reduces credential theft and impersonation. Even more, BSA removes the need to issue, secure, rotate, reset, and manage passwords.
Thaib affirmed that although this technology is new, it brings multiple benefits to its users and also is easy to use.
“For example, today, the company already has a mobile application called Maybank2u. So they still use the Maybank2u, just that once the user is onboarded with BSA or blockchain secure authentication, they just need to upload the latest version from Google Play or Apple Store. So if they just have the latest version, they need to register again to be able to use passwordless with the latest mapping to your application embedded together with the application of blockchain passwordless application.”
Regarding the business implementation, Thaib voiced, “This technology is from South Korea. Our company is a Korean company. So basically, the technology is already proven in South Korea, where the public sector, the governments, the private sector, banking, institutions of education, universities, SMEs are already using this solution.”
Thaib said that for the past few years, FNS has grown to more than 2 million users in South Korea. Expanding the business, the company further introduces this passwordless blockchain-based authentication to the ASEAN market, starting with Malaysia, Indonesia, and Singapore.
Malaysia was chosen due to its goal to be the center of excellence of the Global Hub for the implementation of blockchain-secure authentication outside of Korea, while Singapore and Indonesia were selected because of their location and market maturity.
To penetrate the market, Thaib has carried out several measures, one of which is by being a speaker in Malaysia CIO Network (MCION) 1st Conference this August. Delivering his viewpoint in front of multiple stakeholders is considered as a good strategy to increase the awareness of the importance of going passwordless.
Thaib in his other hat as an executive member of MTSFB is also seating on the board of advisory of the first MCION show in Penang scheduled for August 2023. The role of the advisory board is to encourage fellow C-suites to join the conference.
Thaib also mentioned that FNS presents its BSA technology as the white label innovation. This measure aims to enhance this technology adoption in FNS’s target market.
Moreover, Thaib conveyed, “Our companies also comply with the highest requirements by the regulator as well as by the requirements of the standard like ISO 15048, PCI-DSS, ISO 20000-1, and other requirements. This is something that is new but something that is easily implementable by any organization or company whether in Malaysia, Indonesia, or any other part of the world because we provide both cloud-based solutions as well as on-premise solutions.”
