We’ll admit to having shared a few login credentials amongst friends here and there in our younger days, but it sounds like the party might soon be over: a company called Scout Analytics has developed a way of identifying a user’s “typing cadence,” and matching it to how a username and password are entered. It only takes 5 login attempts of around 12 characters for Scout to nab your cadence, and although 1 in 20,000 people will share the same cadence, combining the data with browser info and IP addresses makes it accurate enough for general usage. No word on what sites are using this technique, but we won’t be surprised if it starts popping up rapidly — and sniffing typing cadences becomes the next great malware scourge.
P.S.- Yes, we just wanted to run the picture of the keyboard pants again. Seriously, can someone please hook us up with those?
Typing ‘cadence’ used to identify authorized database users, lock everyone else out originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 20 Feb 2010 01:57:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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