Authentication is a key requirement for securing today's enterprise.

According to PriceWaterhouseCoopers, the average user today has 40 personal and professional accounts requiring usernames and passwords. Passwords are rarely changed. In fact, a study of 272 large corporations by Intrusion.com found that 13% of users didn't need passwords, 82% weren't required to change their password and 44% weren't required to use sufficiently long passwords. Furthermore, 16% of user accounts were inactive, allowing undetected entry.

Your users use the same passwords everywhere

In a recent study by Which? Magazine in the UK, 50% of all respondents used the same password for all their accounts.

Password Management is expensive for the enterprise!

In addition to being ineffectual, password management and control is very expensive and difficult. According to the Gartner Group, an enterprise with 2500 desktop computers spends an average of $850,000 per year resetting passwords. Gartner estimates that 30-85% of IT helpdesk calls are to reset passwords. At $14-25 per helpdesk call, it adds up.

Security is becoming more important!

Enterprises are increasing their openness. Traveling personnel require access to e-mail, servers, and sales force automation tools. Employees are working from home more often than ever. Partners require access to internal corporate information. At the same time, hackers are getting better tools. Anyone can get a password cracking took from the Internet to crack NT passwords. Script-kiddies have little or no programming experience, but can get tools from the Internet and wreak havoc on a system. The FBI estimates that companies lost $300 billion in 1999 because of computer security break-ins.