ATO prevention strategies are often misunderstood. According to a recent analysis, people over 55 only use an average of 12 passwords, while Millennials use 8 and Gen Z uses just 5. Additionally, 59% of people use the same password everywhere, and the average person has 200 online accounts that require password identification. Furthermore, 43% of logins submitted through most sites are account takeover attempts. The most common breach action over the last 4 years has been the use of stolen credentials, and the cost of ATO to U.S. businesses alone exceeds $5B. Despite this, only 45% of people said they would change their password following a data breach. It is important to note that only 28% of businesses in the US and Canada, 29% in Australia, and 33% in the UK are using Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA), and adoption remains low despite continued education. PII is often exposed on social media, and criminals use it to guess account security questions. Password reuse exposes multiple accounts, and criminals use phishing and social engineering tactics to gain access to accounts.
