Thoughts on modern cybersecurity for retail and hospitality in advance of RH-ISAC’s Cyber Intelligence Summit

Recently Derek Hanson, vice president and product evangelist at Yubico, spoke with Paul Malcomb, cyber threat intelligence analyst and engagement lead at Retail and Hospitality ISAC (RH-ISAC), on their podcast. Derek shared insight on how passwordless authentication using FIDO and phishing-resistant MFA can help retail and hospitality organizations accomplish business goals such as ensuring strong security while enhancing the customer experience. Their conversation highlights important security topics the retail and hospitality industry faces today, including tips and best practices for staying secure as we continue seeing an increase in sophisticated attacks like phishing, smishing and ransomware. 

Check out their discussion here as they dive into the topic in detail at the link below, which starts at 14:48. 

As highlighted in the conversation, cyberattacks are commonplace around the globe and retail and hospitality sectors are among the top three most compromised industries: 

What makes these industries vulnerable?

The high availability of both payment card information (PCI) and other sensitive personal information makes these organizations a lucrative target for cyber attacks including phishing, malware, SIM swaps, and man-in-the-middle (MiTM) attacks. To protect against evolving cyber threats, modern authentication should be a first-line defense of any cybersecurity strategy to secure shared devices, protect sensitive data, and prevent account takeovers. 

Adoption of modern MFA as the bridge to passwordless authentication

Ultimately, the actions of users are the biggest weakness in legacy or basic MFA such as username and passwords, SMS and mobile-based authentication – which are all vulnerable to cyberattacks. The global best practice is to utilize modern phishing-resistant MFA like  a YubiKey, which is a hardware security key that leverages modern, secure authentication protocols like FIDO2 and Webauthn.

YubiKeys prevent phishing and other modern threat vectors and set organizations up to eventually move to passwordless authentication—authentication that does not require the user to provide a password at login at all. Eliminating passwords altogether accrues many benefits to the organization including enhanced security, operational efficiency, fewer calls to the help desk, and less downtime for users. 

In addition to security, the user experience that modern authentication solutions provide is critical for the retail and hospitality industry which is so consumer and customer-facing. Quick and trusted authentication by employees at retail point-of-sale systems, or hotel registration desks and many other scenarios delivers a seamless experience for guests and staff alike. 

Interested to learn more about what Yubico is doing in retail and hospitality?

Join us at the RH-ISAC Cyber Intelligence Summit from September 20-21, 2022 in Plano, Texas, where we’ll be to answer all questions regarding the use of security keys in the retail and hospitality industry.

During the event on Tuesday September 20 at 11:15am CDT, Jerrod Chong, Chief Solutions Officer at Yubico, will be speaking with Art Chernobrov, Director of Identity, Access and Endpoints, from Hyatt Hotel Corporation to discuss how Hyatt is driving innovation and exceptional customer experiences by modernizing their cybersecurity practices by moving to passwordless authentication.

Register with Yubico’s code for the RH-ISAC Cyber Intelligence Summit here (automatically applied), which grants any non-members of the RH-ISAC with free admission to this year’s event. We’re excited to see everyone at the show!

Talk to our teamTalk to our team

Share this article:


  • CEO Corner: Wrapping up a strong year, and looking ahead to 2025 and beyondIt’s no secret that 2024 was a big year of growth for Yubico, highlighted across many notable achievements by our team and increasing demand from our customers. As discussed in my previous post, following a transformative year driven by key cybersecurity trends like passkeys and AI, the year culminated in the significant step of Yubico […]Read moreCEOEarningsMattias Danielsson
  • The rise of AI-driven phishing attacks: What to know and how to be secureAs businesses continue learning the benefits that artificial intelligence (AI) assisted computing tools provide, we’re continuing to see rapid interest and adoption of the technology – especially within the enterprise. Most conversations up until recently have revolved around ChatGPT, but now another new AI-powered large language model tool – DeepSeek – is creating a lot […]Read more
  • Works with YubiKey Spotlight: Expanded partnerships redefining phishing-resistance in 20252024 was an exciting year for Yubico and our partners. Together, we achieved remarkable milestones, launching innovative solutions and forging stronger partnerships – all aimed at delivering the most impactful cybersecurity solutions and user experience for our customers and partners. At the heart of these efforts lies a shared commitment to phishing-resistance.  From registration to […]Read moreWorks with YubiKeywwyk
  • Cybersecurity in 2025 – part two: Insights and predictions from Yubico’s expertsIn part one of our 2025 cybersecurity predictions, we highlighted insights from our experts on the topic of passkeys, digital identity wallets and the threats of AI-driven phishing – areas that saw a lot of focus in 2024, and ones that we expect to continue being a major focus this year. If you missed our […]Read morecritical infrastructurefederal governmentfinancial servicespredictions