Experts warn Brits to cease utilizing passwords in enormous ‘overhaul’ to cease hackers
The UK’s cyber agency has advised the nation it can no longer rely on the combination of letters and numbers and that we should opt for face recognition instead
We’re being warned to move away from passwords(Image: Getty Images/iStockphoto)
Top spooks have warned Brits to stop using passwords online. The UK’s cyber agency has advised the nation it can no longer rely on the combination of letters and numbers.
The National Cyber Security Centre, part of intelligence agency GCHQ, said it is “overhauling decades of practice” because hackers are too often breaking into people’s accounts.
Instead, it is encouraging people to use passkeys like face recognition or fingerprints on their phones.
Jonathon Ellison, director for national resilience at the NCSC, said: “The headaches that remembering passwords have caused us for decades no longer need to be a part of logging in where users migrate to passkeys – they are a user-friendly alternative which provide stronger overall resilience.
“As we aim to accelerate the UK’s cyber defences at scale, moving to passkeys is something all of us can do to improve the security of everyday digital services and be prepared for modern and future cyber threats.”
According to the NCSC, the UK is already the leading country for passkey adoption. Just over half of Google’s active users in the UK are registered with one.
Chris Hosking, from cybersecurity company SentinelOne, said passkeys have the added boost of taking the “onus for security away from people”.
He said: “The reality is we all juggle dozens of logins across our work and personal lives and expecting all your employees to create and manage strong, unique passwords for each one simply isn’t realistic.
“Inevitably people reuse them or stick with the same ones for years.
“That’s why so many major breaches start the same way – a popular service with authenticated users gets breached, those passwords and emails land in data dumps on the dark web, triggering a domino effect that compromises multiple sites and systems.
“Passkeys remove entire classes of attacks, as there’s no password to steal or reuse.”
