Recently Twitter decided to take away SMS text two factor authentication as an
option to secure your Twitter account,
at least for those people who are not paying Twitter Blue subscribers. Now,
whether you think that was a foolish decision or not, that's not the point here.
What I want to share with you is the fact that you now have an opportunity to
increase your security by learning how to use an Authenticator app or security
keys,
and that's what I'm going to show you how to do for your Twitter account right
now.
So what you're going to need is you're going to need either an app on your
phone, you could do Google Authenticator, Authy.
There are a number of good apps on there,
but I would just make sure you stick with one that is reputable.
So I'm going to be going and showing you through Google Authenticator. Or if you
have 2FA keys like these from Yubico, you can use those keys as well.
That's a paid option. The Authenticator app is a free option. Either way,
you want to set up at least one of these at for 2FA on your Twitter account.
So follow along with me in my Twitter account.
I'm going to click down here on "More", then "Settings and Support",
"Settings and Privacy", "Security and Account Access",
"Security", and "Two Factor Authentication". Now,
we're going to ignore the fact that that was way too many clicks to get to a
very important part of securing your Twitter account.
And we're just going to look at the fact that they're giving you three different
options: text message, authenticator app, and a security key. Now,
the text message is going to be taken away shortly for those who aren't Twitter
Blue subscribers and this account is not. So let's just ignore that for right
now. And we're looking at an authenticator app, which is a free option.
And then the security key, the Yubikeys that I was showing you a moment ago.
Let's start with an authenticator app.
I'm going to click over here and I have Google Authenticator open on my phone
right now if you'd rather,
there's Authy or you can even use your password manager like Bitwarden,
1Password and others that allow you to store these time-based one-time
passcodes, which is basically what an authenticator is.
So I'm going to click here to get started and it's going to give you a QR code.
There are two different ways to do this. Now I'm using two devices,
so that works very well. If you don't have two devices,
you can always just click "Can't scan the code?", and it's going to give you a,
I think it's about 16 digit alphanumeric code that you can then copy and paste
or type into whatever authenticator app you're going to use. And that works just
the same as using the QR code,
but I'm going to go ahead and scan the QR code to show you how that works.
So I'll click here to scan a QR code in Authenticator app in my Google
Authenticator app, and now it shows up as a new authenticator code.
So I'm going to go ahead and click next,
and it's going to ask me to type in that code.
So I'm going to go 995 965.
You have to do that quickly because these codes, they cycle every 30 seconds.
You can see that timer that shows that it's cycling down,
and then it will give you a new six digit code.
So this confirms the fact that my authenticator code and my authenticator app is
set up. Now, once you have this set up,
you want to make sure that You have that.
And then you also want to make sure you get this backup code.
Did you see I clicked here and I click this, kick this back, excuse me,
and then I can get this backup code. You want to copy and paste that somewhere,
perhaps. Put that in your password manager, write it down in your password book.
This is the backup for the 2FA that you just set up. Now,
this six digit code isn't something that you're going to have to give over every
single time that you log in to Twitter,
but if you log in using a different device or if you want to change certain
settings within your Twitter account,
it's going to require you to not only put in your password,
but then your two-factor authentication code.
And that's when you're going to open up Authy or Google Authenticator or
1Password to put in that six digit code that changes every 30 seconds.
So that's your first option. An authenticator app is a great way to set up 2FA,
and it's especially good because it's free, so everybody can easily set it up.
You can easily download an Authenticator app and do that. However,
if you want to do that next step of authentication a greater
strength of security, you can use this for a number of different apps,
including your email, a lot of different investment accounts.
That's where you can use security keys. So let's look at how it would look.
And it's also, by the way,
a very good idea to set up multiple methods of authentication.
So I'm going to do two security keys,
or you could do one security key and the Authenticator app,
or you could just do the Authenticator app and the backup code.
It's entirely up to you.
So I'm going to go back into security account and access,
click on security and two factor authentication. I've already obviously set up
my authenticator app. Now let's go into the security key. Again,
very simple. To get started, I'm going to say that I want to add a key,
and I'm going to say that I'm going to do a security key.
I will plug that key in and tap it. And now I can name this as my
Yubikey 5Ci. And again, after I've done this,
I could get the backup code or I could manage my security keys and add another
key. And now I will use my second key.
So I'm going to click in the USB key here, tap that.
And this is my Yubikey 5 series.
Okay, I'm all set. I could get that backup code if I wanted to,
but now you'll notice that I've got two keys that are securing my account as
well as an authenticator app. Again,
I know you might not like the fact that Twitter has taken away SMS 2FA,
but this is an opportunity to increase your security download and learn how to
use authenticator apps and set up your keys.
If you have any questions whatsoever,
leave those in the comments below and you can watch this video to figure out
which key I recommend,
for those of you who are just getting started with authenticator keys,