Biometrics as Part of a MFA Strategy

Scott Westerman is a Florida resident with a Michigan background spanning radio, telecom sales, and publishing. Tech-savvy, Scott Westerman has an understanding of the steps necessary to attain cybersecurity in the personal realm. This can often be achieved through a combination of multi-factor authentication and by using randomly generated, 16-character passwords.

Unfortunately, hackers have their sights on passwords. In today’s evolving online matrix, many secure platforms are forgoing passwords altogether, or combining them with multifactor authentication (MFA) techniques involving facial mapping/recognition and biometrics. The multiple credentials involved help boost security. At the same time, while some of these technologies have been available for years, they are reaching a critical point where most new laptops and smart devices integrate biometrics.

Biometrics involves reading the user’s fingerprint or iris, or recognizing elements such as the voice, in tandem with texts or passwords. Because biometric qualities are inherently linked to the user, they are seen as a reliable re-authentication factor in situations where the user is verifying a new device or gets locked out of their account.

First US Commercial Radio Broadcast

Based in Florida, Scott Westerman is a multifaceted entrepreneur whose experience spans telecommunications, radio, podcasting, and publishing. With an extensive background in Michigan radio, Scott Westerman has a strong interest in the history of the airwaves and technologies that drove communications breakthroughs in the early 20th century.

The first-ever commercial broadcast was made by KDKA, Pittsburgh, on November 2, 1920. The background was one in which voice radio was largely reserved for engineers and enthusiasts known as amateur, or “ham” operators. These people typically dealt with cumbersome equipment of the time that required skill to put together and operate.

With a next generation of ready-made radios set to target purely recreational consumers, manufacturer Westinghouse sought a way of boosting sales in 1920. Instead of the radio simply being a means of communication between “hams,” the device could be used by any listener who tuned in to a specific frequency at a certain time.

November 2 was selected for the broadcast premiere because it was the date of the Harding-Cox Presidential election. This was an opportunity to demonstrate that election results could be broadcast to the public much sooner than newspapers printed them. Prompted by the success of this broadcast, by the mid-1920s, more than 600 commercial radio stations had emerged nationwide.