Google in favor of different password scheme
Having a multitude of passwords for all our different Web activities is a hassle and many people go the unsafe route of one or two passwords for everything. Google is advocating a method it calls “hybrid onboarding”:
Does anyone actually like passwords? Most people can’t stand them because they end up having to keep track of a long (and often memorized) list of usernames and passwords to sign into the websites they visit. Website owners hate them because it’s hard to get people to create a new account on their website, and almost half of those account registrations are never completed. Thanks to the utilization of new technology, we’re now seeing large-scale success in eliminating the need for passwords while increasing the successful registration rate at websites to over 90%. The most visible examples come from Plaxo, Facebook, Yahoo! and Google using a technique the industry calls hybrid onboarding.
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At PC World, Jeff Bertolucci comments:
It’s one of the basic tenets of online security: Never use the same password/username combo for every website that requires one. The logic is sound, of course. A single security breach could expose your most private information — such as banking and credit card numbers — to the bad guys.
Problem is, who can remember multiple passwords and usernames? Many times I’ve signed up for a service, returned to the site a few weeks later, and quickly realized that I couldn’t remember my login details.
Google and other major online players, including AOL, Facebook, Microsoft Plaxo, MySpace, and Yahoo, are pitching a simpler alternative: A single password/username combo, such as your Google or Yahoo ID, for multiple sites. The concept, based on the industry standard OpenID 2.0 protocol isn’t exactly new. In fact, Google announced over a year ago that it would support the single single-in plan.
So it’s a single sign-in but with some additional safety over just using the same password everywhere. However, Bertolucci doesn’t think Microsoft and others will buy it:
OpenID is a great idea, but wider acceptance is needed for it to become truly useful. I suspect that Yahoo, Microsoft, and Google aren’t truly comfortable with a single sign-in approach for their key properties. Today, for instance, I can’t use my Yahoo ID to sign into my MSN account, nor can I use my Windows Live ID to enter Yahoo Mail.
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