MWC Showed Rise of FIDO Standards, Biometrics: FIDO

In the wake of this year’s Mobile World Congress, the FIDO Alliance is heralding the increasing prominence of its standards in the mobile sector.

Mobile ID Word President Peter O’Neill (left) and Andrew Shikiar, Senior Director of Marketing, FIDO Alliance (right) at Mobile World Congress 2017

Offering its MWC takeaways in a new blog post, the consortium points out that a number of MNOs at the show had either adopted FIDO standards or were in the process of doing so, both because of the simplicity and effectiveness of the standards themselves and because the new PSD2 regulations were pushing their adoption in Europe. At the same time, the GSMA’s Mobile Connect platform is spreading around the world, offering a universal login platform for mobile users that uses biometric authentication compliant with FIDO standards.

Citing Acuity Market Intelligence, FIDO points out that the past two years have seen a tenfold increase in biometric smartphones on the market. Given the compatibility of biometric authentication and FIDO standards, it’s no surprise that this trend has risen along with growing FIDO compliance.

Looking ahead, similar trends may occur in the emerging Internet of Things, for which FIDO says its standards are “a natural fit”. There’s certainly a need for the kind of security that FIDO and biometrics have to offer, and good reason to expect it to be met.