For some people, it is quite natural to go for the highest level of security possible. Unfortunately, I see it over and over again that people refuse to enable all possible mechanisms to keep their data safe.

Dealing with crypto comes hand in hand with the responsibility of managing your funds in a secure way. These days most sites - especially the relevant crypto exchanges - will offer you to enable multifactor (2-step verification) to increase security when it comes to accessibility of your account. From my experience, people stop once they have enabled their MFA to protect their accounts, but here I want to talk from experience what you need to make the most out of your 2-step verification setup.

What is Multifactor authentication (MFA)?

An extra layer of security

Most people only have one layer – their password – to protect their account. With 2-Step Verification, if a bad guy hacks through your password layer, he'll still need your phone or Security Key to get into your account. 

 

Sign in will require something you know and something you have

With 2-Step Verification, you'll protect your account with something you know (your password) and something you have (your phone or Security Key).

(Source: Google)

Although you might have enabled MFA for your account at Binance or Bitmex, I highly recommend checking if you have enabled MFA for your email account as well. Your email address is easily leaked to cybercriminals and once they gain access to your email account you want to avoid that attackers can start compromising other accounts just by using confidential data in your email account. As an example I used the MFA setup from Google:

Google has even a landing page without looking at security settings as it is usually quite buried in your account options. Simply visit https://www.google.com/landing/2step/ if you use google mail. 

Once you click on get started Google will guide you through the setup process. Ideally, you will setup your smartphone during the process and use the Google authenticator app. This app will provide you with a unique verification code every time you want to access your Google services. Don't worry you can adjust settings for those devices from where you log in to Google regularly. You should also check if there are still outdated devices assigned to your account and remove them. 

There are two additional things to complete a MFA setup:

1) Go to the security settings in Google and remove your phone number. There is no need to leave it here.

2) Finally, you have to make sure that you can access your Google services if you have no access to your mobile anymore. Go to https://myaccount.google.com/ and click on "security" on the left. Here you can create backup codes that can be used in case you need to access your Google account without having access to your device that have been configured to provide your unique identifier numbers. Treat those backup codes in a similar way as your recovery seeds for your crypto wallets. Store them in a secure place and not digital.

Your email account is much more attractive to cybercriminals than the account at your favourite crypto exchange as it gives you a lot of control. Whenever it comes to configuring MFA keep to these simple guidelines to make sure it is set up correctly. 

Stay safe and take care

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