AUSTIN, Tex., Nov. 15 — The Texas Advanced Computing Center (TACC) at The University of Texas at Austin, one of the nation’s leading advanced computing centers, and Toopher, online security’s user experience company, today announced that beginning in December TACC will test pilot Toopher’s Invisible Multifactor Authentication technology for secure access in TACC’s supercomputing environment.

“Operating powerful computing systems with national and International profile for thousands of researchers across the globe exposes us to some risks, even though the purpose of these open science systems is entirely for the public good,” said TACC Director Jay Boisseau. “To ensure that our researchers are able to be fully productive, we need to maximize security and uptime, while not imposing barriers to using the systems. By leveraging smartphones and GPS, Toopher is developing the most exciting technology I’ve seen for increasing security without getting in the user’s way.”

TACC will be a key exhibitor at next week’s supercomputing conference (SC13) November 18-21 in Denver. Lance Kelly, Toopher’s director of Business Development, will present in the TACC booth on Wednesday, November 20, on “invisible” authentication technology. The annual Supercomputing Conference is now in its 25th year as the leading international conference for high-performance computing, networking, storage and analysis.

Toopher offers invisible, location-based multifactor authentication and authorization with the location of your smartphone, which is ideal for protecting logins, online payments, and other sensitive online actions. Toopher pushes a notification to users when a login attempt is made. This includes the who, what, when and where of the login. If the request is valid, the user clicks “allow” and is immediately granted account access. If the request is suspicious, the user can “deny,” effectively defeating online fraud. Through Toopher’s patented technology, the user can automate this decision from safe locations so the next time a safe login is made, the service interacts invisibly with a user’s smartphone in their pocket, granting them immediate access with no action on the part of the user.

“Toopher provides a new and innovative approach to multi-factor authentication and can add to our comprehensive science environment,” said Nathaniel Mendoza, manager of TACC’s Technical Infrastructure Group. “Enabling strong security with easy access and usability is what we want to extend to our users, many of whom are in academic environments.”

Founded in 2011 and closing $2M funding in early 2013, Toopher was started by Evan Grim, a UT PhD candidate in software engineering, and Josh Alexander, an adjunct professor teaching financial derivatives at UT McCombs School of Business. Toopher has steadily worked its way to commercialization, accelerated through its involvement as a portfolio company of the Austin Technology Incubator at The University of Texas at Austin. Toopher is widely in use, supporting more than eight million users through partnerships with companies like LastPass, MailChimp, and MiiCard.

About TACC

The Texas Advanced Computing Center (TACC) at The University of Texas at Austin is one of the leading advanced computing centers in the United States. The center’s mission is to enable discoveries that advance science and society through the application of advanced computing technologies. To fulfill this mission, TACC identifies, evaluates, deploys and supports powerful computing, visualization and storage systems and software. TACC helps researchers and educators use these technologies effectively, and conduct research and development to make these technologies more powerful, more reliable and easier to use. TACC also encourages, educates and trains the next generation of researchers, empowering them to make discoveries that change the world. Learn more: http://www.tacc.utexas.edu

About Toopher

Toopher is an invisible, location-based multifactor authentication solution designed around user behavior and powered by your phone’s location awareness. By marrying the strongest, state-of-the-art, true out-of-band pervasive technology with decidedly lean and thoughtful user experience, Toopher automates the authentication process via your phone–not only preventing online fraud and identity theft, but creating a security solution that people actually want to use. No more passwords hacks, no more codes. It’s simple, secure, and your phone stays in your pocket.

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Source: TACC