HYDRO RAINDROP, THE FUTURE OF 2FA AND ONLINE SECURITY

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Today, millions are embracing virtual currencies and having substantial proportions of their savings and means of livelihood in the crypto-currency banks. As we invest, bank, socialize, work and play online, our crypto and digital activities are becoming increasingly vulnerable and are exposed to cyber-or-crypto-security risks. Hackers are on the prowl, lurking around every corner of the digital space ready to steal our identities, drain our wallets/accounts, and lock us out of our investments. Hence, the need to take extra precautions to safeguard our crypto assets has become increasingly more pertinent than ever.

You might have heard of two-factor authentication (2FA) and wondered what it is. It has become a valuable tool in the efforts aimed at safeguarding digital space security. Together with security software for your PC/mobile device and a password manager, 2FA could guard against hack and unknown logins from unknown persons.

There are literally billions of breached log-ins circulating on the dark web. These have resulted in username and password theft incidents on a massive scale. With these log-in details in the hands of cyber-criminals, the consequences are far-reaching for the victims. What all of these mean is that, practicing good password security is certainly a good idea to ensuring the safety of your online assets. But the steady stream of never-ending breaches will continue to put your log-ins at risk, and make managing the security of your online accounts a burden.

2FA (Two Factor Authentication) adds an extra layer of protection to the authentication process for account log-ins. It requires users to provide a second piece of identifying information in addition to a password. Examples of 2FA prompts include answering a question like "What was your childhood Alias name?" or entering a verification code received via text message, email or an app code. The notion of 2FA as a best security practice is increasing. There are currently two 2FA products on the market presently; Google Authenticator and Authy. Google brought the advanced form of online security into the mainstream conscience with the launch of multilayered protection for enterprise customers. In terms of security they both Google Authenticator and Authy provide a service for extra security, although they both have disadvantages compared to the Hydro 2FA App which doesnt make them entirely foolproof in giving you that total online security assurance.

UNLEASHING HYDROGEN 2FA — RAINDROP
The rise of the data age has brought with it a rise in vulnerability, and this is particularly important for financial services. Financial platforms are often gateways to large quantities of private and sensitive data such as government ID numbers, account credentials, and transaction histories. Because of how critically important this data is, unwarranted access is typically met with catastrophic results.

The proposed hydrogen technology is called "Raindrop". This is a transaction performed through a smart contract that validates private system access publicly, and can complement existing private authentication methods. The Raindrop technology is intended to provide additional security for sensitive financial data that is increasingly at risk from hacking and breaches. Implementation of the Hydro Raindrop is performed on the Hydrogen API Platform.

This modular set of APIs is available to enterprises and developers globally to prototype, build, test, and deploy sophisticated financial technology platforms and products. According to the co-founder and CEO of Hydrogen Platform, Mike Kane, Hydrogen RAINDROP exists to fix a lot of the issues with current authentication frameworks, including poor security, centralization and recovery. The hydro 2FA App fixes issues of centralization. That means it will protect you from the clients side and also from your financial institution (second parties). Also, another problem it solves is that when a server is down, it doesnt affect your Authentication App due to other servers working normally. In terms of recovery, if you lose your mobile device, RAINDROP comes here to play with a seed regeneration feature. This feature enables you to enter your recovery seed words so as to recover your authenticator and funds.

Raindrop-based verification with Hydro is analogous. Rather than sending the user an amount and having it relayed back, is defines a transaction and the user must execute it from a known wallet. The only way the user can conduct a valid transaction is by accessing the wallet in question. By using Raindrops, both the system and the accessor can monitor authorization attempts on an immutable public ledger. This blockchain-based transaction is decoupled from the basic system operations, occurs on a distributed network, and depends upon the ownership of private keys. Therefore, it serves as a useful validation vector. Having the above features and many more, HYDRO 2FA is the future of authentication. It solves much, if not all, of the problems we currently have with our security based on Authenticators and has the potential for much more. Any platform be it an API, application, enterprise software, gaming platform, etc. - can leverage Hydro for authentication purposes and incorporate this blockchain layer into an authentication framework or REST API.