New Delhi, July 29 -- As transactions have grown increasingly digital, service providers rarely (if ever) come face-to-face with their customers. This means that without reliable means of authentication, they have no way to ensure that the products and services they sell actually end up in the hands of those who bought them.

One way to address this would be to insist on multiple factors of authentication. In practical terms, this means that in addition to proving who you are in reference to 'something you know' (such as a PIN or a password), you would also be required to do so with reference to 'something you have' (such as a hardware token or a mobile device) or 'something you are' (such as a fingerprint or another biometric identifier)...