Imagine this situation: A customer calls your contact center to resolve a billing issue. He wants the process to be quick but is also anxious about the safety of his personal information, which he has shared with your contact center throughout the process. He expects your contact center to keep his information private and maintain its security at all costs. In a world where cyber threats are becoming more frequent and growing daily, contact centers are the prime target for attackers as they are the frontline of customer engagement.
Contact centers need to handle vast amounts of customer data daily. It includes sensitive information such as bank account details, social security numbers, credit card information, transaction histories, etc. Cybercriminals are always on the hunt for such data. For businesses, this is their more significant responsibility. Every interaction tests their trust. That’s why companies do everything to avoid the fallout of data breaches, which often result in lost revenue, damaged reputations, and heavy legal penalties.
That’s where businesses need to introduce multifactor authentication in their processes. Multifactor authentication requires multiple layers of verification at every step. It ensures that only authorized people, whether customers or agents, can access the sensitive information and systems.
But, the role of multifactor authentication in contact centers goes far beyond whatever is mentioned above. More than that, introducing multifactor authentication in your contact is about building trust, ensuring compliance, and helping agents create a perfect customer experience. In this digital-first world, a robust security framework such as multifactor authentication in contact centers acts more than just as a safeguard. Multifactor authentication (MFA) guarantees customers that their privacy and safety are the topmost priorities.
Let’s discover why implementing Multifactor authentication (MFA) in your contact is an innovative and essential step.
Why Is Introducing Multifactor Authentication Essential in the Contact Center?
In the process of resolving customers’ problems, contact centers end up collecting large amounts of data every day. Customers expect that their data is safe and secure and will not be compromised. To fulfill these expectations, contact centers adopt many methods. They have long been dependent on traditional password methods. However, using traditional passwords alone can’t be sufficient to protect customers’ data in today’s digital environment.
Meanwhile, cybercriminals have become more sharp and are developing sophisticated ideas to steal the information. It has made contact centers more wary. As a result, they have focused on adopting multifactor authentication in their businesses. Multifactor authentication has emerged as the defense layer for businesses to safeguard customers’ accounts from unauthorized access. Implementing multifactor authentication brings many benefits for contact centers, making it non-negotiable.
Rising number of cyber threats
Cyber crimes are no longer a new term in contact centers. Since these businesses operate with a large volume of data, cybercriminals find it easy to steal customers’ information through unethical means, which we know as cyber threats. Cybercriminals can cause data breaches through malware or hacking attacks on your contact center. This is intended to steal or expose personal data. Likewise, cybercriminals can steal your devices and log in through accounts to access your network.
They perform such attacks with strong strategies. For example, cybercriminals can pose themselves as customers and steal information. Fraudsters can also pretend to be from your company and call customers to fetch valuable information.
The tricks we discussed above are not hypothetical threats. These things happen daily, and most contact centers are on target. So, what can be done to keep contact centers safe and protected from these attacks? Multifactor authentication can help by acting as a powerful shield, and even if your password is stolen, it provides an extra layer of verification that ensures your system remains secure.
Pressure from Regulatory Authorities
Call centers must follow strict rules and regulations set by regulatory bodies or organizations such as the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). Anyone running a contact center must adhere to call center compliance, which covers topics such as guaranteeing legal compliance and consumer and moral behavior. Call center compliance, such as PCI DSS, OFCOM, Data protection compliance, etc., is crucial for several reasons.
Some of these reasons are.
Regulatory agencies impose hefty fines on call centers that do not comply. We know that unwanted calls, data security breaches, and deceptive sales practices can all negatively impact your business financially.
Also, consumers expect fair treatment from contact centers. They want to go to the one that keeps their personal information secure. Compliance blunders, such as intrusive phone calls and data breaches, may seriously harm your company’s reputation.
Now, contact centers understand that non-compliance can be risky and expensive. In this scenario, multi-factor authentication can be the best practice. More than that, it is the requirement that can help you meet the compliance guidelines and ensure that you are on the right side of the law while protecting the reputation of your business.
Pressure from Customers for Security
Call centers heavily rely on various communication channels, such as SMS, calls, online chat, or emails. If your contact center does not provide strong encryption techniques, cybercriminals can easily steal data through these means. Also, customers are aware of data breaches—it is right to say they are hyper-aware.
They want you to keep their data safe and secure. When people hear that their data has been hacked, even from the databases of major companies, it is natural for them to feel insecure and frustrated. Here, suppose you implement multifactor authentication in your company. In that case, you are giving a clear message to your customers that your contact center is highly determined to protect their data and value their trust in you. This level of confidence retains your existing customers and brings new ones.
Security in Remote Work
With hybrid and remote work becoming the new regular and more employees working from home, more devices and applications are in use. This increases the threat of cyber-attacks and data breaches, as the visibility of potential threats is unclear. Sometimes, your end user may be on an unsecured home network. All these scenarios have made it difficult to ensure secure access to systems.
In this case, when you implement multifactor authentication in the contact center, even if the cyber attackers gain access to your credentials, they can’t go further due to double verification. Whether your agents are logging into their systems from a coffee shop or their home, they need to prove their beyond just providing a password. MFA introduces an extra layer of security, where you must enter your username and password through a security code sent to your email ID or phone. It can also be some facial features or fingerprints.
Wrapping Up
Your contact center is not just a place for resolving customer issues; it is the gateway through which you can win and retain your customers’ trust. Imagine a contact center that provides both high security and seamless communication. CTI Integration can elevate the implementation of multifactor authentication.
When you implement MFA in your systems by integrating your operations through CTI connectors, it asks your systems to authenticate a customer’s identity at multiple verification levels. Meanwhile, it doesn’t interrupt the flow of the conversation. With features like dynamic prompts, voice biometrics, and one-time passwords, CTI ensures that multifactor authentication provides an integrated, smooth, and user-friendly experience.
Implementing multifactor authentication strengthens the bond of trust between you and your customers by meeting security standards. More than this, with this implementation, you are sending a clear message to your customers that their safety and privacy matter to you.
With MFA in place, you offer your customers peace of mind by protecting their sensitive data from cybercriminals, ensuring secure access to remote teams, and meeting compliance requirements.
In this era of growing cyberattacks, CTI-driven multifactor solutions have become essential to ensure data safety. With NovelVox’s CTI connectors, you integrate MFA seamlessly into your business processes.
