Posted by Christiaan Brand, Product Manager, Google Cloud Securing access to online accounts is critical for safeguarding private, financial, and other sensitive data online. Phishing – where an attacker tries to trick you into giving them your username and password – is one of the most common causes of data breaches. To protect user accounts, we’ve long made it a priority to offer users many convenient forms of 2-Step Verification (2SV), also known as two-factor authentication (2FA), in addition to Google’s automatic protections. These measures help to ensure that users are not relying solely on passwords for account security. For users at higher risk (e.g., IT administrators, executives, politicians, activists) who need more effective protection against targeted attacks, security keys provide the strongest form of 2FA. To make this phishing-resistant security accessible to more people and businesses, we recently built this capability into Android phones, expanded the availability of Titan Security Keys to more regions (Canada, France, Japan, the UK), and extended Google’s Advanced Protection Program to the enterprise. Starting tomorrow, you will have an additional option: Google’s new USB-C Titan Security Key, compatible with your Android, Chrome OS, macOS, and Windows devices.USB-C Titan Security KeyWe partnered with Yubico to manufacture the USB-C Titan Security Key. We have had a long-standing working and customer relationship with Yubico that began in 2012 with the collaborative effort to create the FIDO Universal 2nd Factor (U2F) standard, the first open standard to enable phishing-resistant authentication. This is the same security technology that we use at Google to protect access to internal applications and systems.USB-C Titan Security Keys are built with a hardware secure element chip that includes firmware engineered by Google to verify the key’s integrity. This is the same secure element chip and firmware that we use in our existing USB-A/NFC and Bluetooth/NFC/USB Titan Security Key models manufactured in partnership with Feitian Technologies.USB-C Titan Security Keys will be available tomorrow individually for $40 on the Google Store in the United States. USB-A/NFC and Bluetooth/NFC/USB Titan Security Keys will also become available individually in addition to the existing bundle. Bulk orders are available for enterprise organizations in select countries.We highly recommend all users at a higher risk of targeted attacks to get Titan Security Keys and enroll into the Advanced Protection Program (APP), which provides Google’s industry-leading security protections to defend against evolving methods that attackers use to gain access to your accounts and data. You can also use Titan Security Keys for any site where FIDO security keys are supported for 2FA, including your personal or work Google Account, 1Password, Coinbase, Dropbox, Facebook, GitHub, Salesforce, Stripe, Twitter, and more.