Microsoft today announced that it is rolling out optional two-factor authentication to the 700 million or so Microsoft Account users, confirming last week’s rumors . The scheme will become available to all users “in the next few days.” It works essentially identically to existing schemes already available for Google accounts. Two-factor authentication augments a password with a one-time code that’s delivered either by text message or generated in an authentication app. Computers that you trust will be allowed to skip the two factors and just use a password, and application-specific passwords can be generated for interoperating with software that doesn’t support two-factor authentication. Read 1 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Microsoft rolls out standards-compliant two-factor authentication