The Personal Identity Verification (PIV) card is used in non-military government agencies for authentication and identification to gain access to systems, networks, and online resources. These cards, in combination with a personal identification number, meet two-factor requirements. PIV credentials also are designed to help reduce counterfeiting and are tamper-resistant.

An authenticator app, such as Google Authenticator, is another method to achieve two-factor authentication. It is a free app available for installation on mobile devices.

The U.S. federal government authorizes the use of PIVs as well as authenticator apps, depending on the circumstances.

Answer the following question(s):

1. In what type of situation would an authenticator app provide adequate two-factor authentication for federal government use? Provide rationale or a citation for your answer.
2. In what type of situation would a PIV be required for federal government use? Provide rationale or a citation for your answer.

Answer:

Solution 1: An authenticator application would basically try to identify and then authenticate the identity of the user before they can actually access any system, network or the online resources. This application makes use of a certain mechanism on the basis of the biometric factors such as the fingeprint, retina scan, facial recognition or the voice recognition to collect and authenticate the identity of a particular user so that the it can be made sure that the right kind of person enter the system. Now, an authenticator system would be mandatory in cases where the system recources are just way too critical and there is a continuous threat from the hackers as well as crackers to attack and compromise these resources and if these resources got compromosied then the organization might have to face a lot of questions and there would be financial as well as psychological losses, For example, Nuclear Facility, Army Base, National Investigation Agency, etc. As a convention, the authenticator applications actually help the government or any organization to actually secure their critical information assets which if got compromised would lead to heavy financial as well as psychological losses to the organization.

Solution 2: A Personal Identity Verification or PIV is a kid of card that is used by the governments or the organizations to identify a particular person and authenticate their access to the resources that they demand. But this mechanism is only used in the field where the risk of penetration as well as the hacking attacks are minimal and the information represented by these systems is not that critical or useful to the state at all. In this case, the authentication is performed only a single time and this is only due to the fact that the information that is present within the system represents a lower risk of getting compromised or hacked for example, the number of people got vaccinated, the number of people who paid their taxes in last fiscal year, etc. such kind of information is not a state secret and is kind of public information which if got compromised would not lead to a large scale escalation and hence only a single factor authentication is used. So, as a convention in all the fields that are non-millitary, non-intelligence, etc. the PIVs can be used for the authentication of the peoples accesses to these information resources.