this post was submitted on 19 Jul 2023
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Even weirder to me is what my bank does, which is use a third-party app (Symantec VIP) that is based on standard TOTP but wraps it in their own proprietary layer to prevent importing it into other apps. The bank gains absolutely nothing from this, and neither does the customer. If they wanna use a proprietary app with extra functionality like how Microsoft’s 2FA app does push notifications, I get that. If they want to push their own app for branding purposes, I hate that, but I get it. But why force me into a different company’s app that adds no value to the experience?
Getting the user to use their app is pretty important. You may only be using TOTP now, but it allows for more intelligent multi factor authentication later on.
E.g. the app could check your risk profile, like where you're accessing from and if any impossible travel took place. They may add multi step auth like push notifications or biometrics.
By letting customers use Google authenticator you are limiting MFA to only TOTP. MFA isn't just an on and off switch anymore.
That's definitely an interesting case for using their own app for MFA, but it doesn't explain why you would use a specific restrictive third-party MFA app like Symantec VIP. This is truly the worst of all worlds.
edit: worst of all app-based MFA worlds, anyway. Obviously better than using SMS second-factor, and way better than not having MFA at all...
Some vendors would allow you to skin their SDK to essentially have your own version of their app published, but that is a lot of work and has its own security risks.
There isn't really a BYO app that gives you the functionality a vendor app can give.
Good MFA is harder than people think.
Sure, but I'm not talking abuot whitelabelling. I'm talking about my bank telling me "go to the Play Store and download Symantec VIP". An app that just does TOTP, but in a way that doesn't enable you to use your own preferred TOTP app instead (without some rather difficult hacks).
Like I said, if they were using an app that provided more functionality than TOTP, I wouldn't mind too much. If they were using an app that allowed them to put in their own branding, I'd be annoyed but at least "get it". What I'm getting here is the worst of both worlds.
Believe me, I know. At my former workplace, I was one of the leading engineers on a project to make our product support MFA. The business folks wanted it built into our existing app (for marketing reasons) and wanted push notifications, not TOTP. Three times we were working on that project, had given estimates for time to finish and had even made some substantial progress in implementing it, when business priorities shifted and the work got scrapped in favour of something unrelated, eventually coming back to it with a scope that was just different enough that most of the work already done couldn't be reused. I've spent a lot of time looking at MFA from a software engineer's perspective.