I would love it if my bank had “duress passwords/pins”. So that If I were ever held up and forced to extract money from my bank account – If I typed in my special PIN it would alert the police I was in trouble. Also it could do fancy stuff like reduce my funds to a minimal amounts to protect loss (and still give the crook something as to not raise suspicion) and auto cancel my credit cards etc.
Having alternate passwords could also work in less life threatening situations – i.e. giving your msn/aim/facebook/myspace password to your girlfriend – give them the special one that discreetly limits access.
This is a random post isn’t it? Heh I’m exhausted and when I’m like this I come up with really random ideas.
Binary Fortress Software » Blog Archive » Andrew McTeer: The Idea Machine
October 10th, 2007
[...] My buddy, Andy, is a freakin’ idea machine. This guy has as many ideas as I do heart beats. His latest idea is possibly one of the best security related things I have heard in a long time. Check this out: I would love it if my bank had “duress passwords/pins”. So that If I were ever held up and forced to extract money from my bank account – If I typed in my special PIN it would alert the police I was in trouble. Also it could do fancy stuff like reduce my funds to a minimal amount to protect loss (and still give the crook something as to not raise suspicion). [...]
Jon Tackabury
October 10th, 2007
This is a seriously good idea man, I love it. I can’t believe that no one has thought of it before, and if they have I can’t believe no one has implemented it yet. Genius, as usual.
Adam Dempsey
October 11th, 2007
Is random, but also a very clever idea. Especially the msn/aim/facebook/myspace idea, you could have a lower password which had limited contacts and no chat logs or something