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A bipartisan cadre of senators sent a letter to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Tuesday calling out the department's poor adoption of multi-factor authentication.
Why it matters: Multi-factor authentication requires users to take an additional protective step when logging into an account — often a physical key or a biometric scan. Beyond being a good practice for federal agencies, multi-factor authentication is also the law for all high-level government accounts.
The gripe: Sens. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), Cory Gardner (D-Colo.), Rand Paul (R-Kent.), Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H) pointed to a recent Government Accountability Office report that found only 11% of required agency devices had enhanced security.
"We are sure you will agree on the need to protect American diplomacy from cyber attacks, which is why we have such a hard time understanding why the Department of State has not followed the lead of many other agencies and complied with federal law requiring agency use of MFA."— Quote from the letter