Adopters of the FIDO protocols who pass certification testing may apply to use the FIDO Certified logo at their sites and associated with their qualifying product materials, packaging, advertising, etc. The logo signals to consumers, customers and partners that a product is part of a range of FIDO-based strong authentication solutions that are broadly interoperable.
FIDO Certified testing is open to members and non-members and uses industry-standard best practices to objectively evaluate technical implementations of the FIDO 1.0 specifications, which are made up of the Universal Authentication Framework (UAF) and Universal 2nd Factor (U2F). The growing ecosystem of FIDO products and services enables companies, organizations and individuals to move beyond using just passwords, or to eliminate them altogether. The Alliance also offers simple logo usage terms for the millions of potential websites and relying parties that require an easy way to demonstrate FIDO support.
“FIDO certification satisfies a need to ensure that implementations of the FIDO specification are uniform across products and that those products are interoperable,” said Brett McDowell, executive director of the FIDO Alliance. “The FIDO Certified program offers the type of oversight that vertical industries need to hasten the adoption of strong authentication products that stretch across enterprise boundaries and the range of mobile and other devices key in today’s computing environment.”
FIDO certification is performed using a set of test tools developed by the FIDO Alliance, followed by participation in a proctored interoperability event. The FIDO Certified testing complements the previous FIDO Ready™ program, which was the first brand that defined FIDO tested products.
“Certification of serious security components and sub-systems is absolutely essential as we have come to realize how much is at stake when authentication systems don’t perform as expected. With major data breaches escalating, so is demand for strong authentication,” said Steve Wilson, Vice President and Principal Consultant at Constellation Research. “Moreover, demand for certified authentication solutions is also rising. A standards based authentication solution is only as good as its conformance to those standards. The FIDO Alliance has worked hard on its conformance program from the very beginning. The new FIDO Certified program is well thought through, and isn’t just another box ticking exercise. It complements and reinforces the Alliance’s rigorous specifications development from incubation right through to standardization.”
