LACNIC Members: Importance of Protecting Your Access Credentials

01/07/2024

LACNIC Members: Importance of Protecting Your Access Credentials
Designed by Freepik

By Graciela Martínez and Alfredo Verderosa

During LACNIC 41, we presented an update of the two-factor authentication (2FA) system. The goal was to stress its importance and raise awareness among LACNIC members.

Why is this cause for concern? Because we discovered that more than 574 access credentials to various LACNIC systems were for sale on different black markets.

In addition, at the beginning of this year we detected 120 successful logins by unauthorized third parties to MiLACNIC (the platform for LACNIC members) and immediately created a working group to manage the incident appropriately.

Compromised Accounts

Of the 574 compromised accounts we detected, nearly 80% were using weak or very weak passwords.

Therefore, in addition to using stronger passwords, it is essential to include another authentication factor in the authentication process.

Incorporating multiple authentication factors to verify the user’s identity adds an additional layer of security.

(Free access, no subscription required)

Consider the following best practices to protect access to your accounts:

  • Don’t use the same password across different platforms
  • Don’t share your credentials
  • Use password managers
  • Make sure to update your systems
  • Only use official apps
  • Keep an eye out to detect potentially compromised credentials
  • Use strong passwords and implement 2FA

Our call to action? Use strong passwords and a second authentication factor.

What did LACNIC do to contain the incident?

In the case of the security incident, none of the compromised accounts were using two-factor authentication to access MiLACNIC.

The views expressed by the authors of this blog are their own and do not necessarily reflect the views of LACNIC.

Subscribe
Notify of

0 Comments
Oldest
Newest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments