Yubico rolls out subscription service for hardware authentication keys
Yubico is pushing further into the Asia Pacific market with the announcement of its first regional client aboard the company's new global YubiEnterprise Subscription.
Historically, Yubico sold its hardware authentication security keys, called YubiKeys, on a per-device basis. The company expanded its offerings through the YubiEnterprise Subscription service, which is an as-a-service offering on a per user basis.
The YubiEnterprise subscription is available through channel partners in Australia, New Zealand, and worldwide.
"YubiEnterprise Subscription provides considerable cost and time savings, helping organisations to simplify their approach to strong authentication as their business evolves," says Yubico EMEA and APAC senior vice president Fredrik Krantz.
"With immediate success from the initial roll out in the US and Canada, we are proud to now offer YubiEnterprise Subscription to our APAC channel partners."
Australian-based Yubico reseller partner NQBE scored the deal with the regional council. Although the information is scarce at present, NQBE CEO Andrew Phillips says that security threats evolve rapidly, which means protection technologies must also evolve too – and a subscription service can ensure that these technologies are up to date.
"The YubiEnterprise Subscription model was very appealing to us in terms of our annual IT budget as it lowered the cost of entry, allowed us to spread the payments across the year and shifted our IT spending from capital expenditure to operating expenditure."
"The user-based pricing model enables us to reassign subscriptions to new users, request replacement YubiKeys, get free upgrades when new YubiKeys come out and even order buffer stock for peak periods," he continues.
"This will make it even easier for our customers to successfully implement projects quickly. It offers them unlimited access to Yubico's security experts to help with the rollout and onboarding process, as well as priority problem handling and dedicated support."
Yubico recently released a new NFC-capable version of its YubiKey. The 5C NFC is able to provide authentication through near-field communication (NFC) and USB-C connections. The key supports multiple authentication protocols including: FIDO2 and WebAuthn, FIDO U2F, PIV (smart card), OATH-HOTP and OATH-TOTP (hash-based and time-based one-time passwords), OpenPGP, YubiOTP, and challenge-response.
YubiKey 5C NFC can be used to authenticate across platforms including iOS, Android, Windows, macOS and Linux — and on any mobile device, laptop, or desktop computer that supports USB-C ports or NFC.
Through YubiEnterprise Subscription and YubiEnterprise Delivery, organizations can deploy YubiKey authentication at scale, regardless of employee locations. IT administrators can upgrade to the latest YubiKey form factors, including the YubiKey 5C NFC.
