Augie Ray reported in a Forrester blog post on a recent survey of 4,000 consumers regarding single sign-on IDs. This study found that consumers are not yet interested in utilizing the property primarily because they have not yet realized the benefits associated with it.

Single sign-on allows users to use one login ID to gain access to multiple systems without being promoted to log in again for each of them. Ray identifies examples of applications that use single sign-on including Facebook Connect, Open ID, and OAuth. Benefits of using single sign-on include reduction of password fatigue- an association attributed to the multiple passwords a user is required to remember. According to SAP® Security white papers, “Improve Business Results with Single Sign-On” and “Improve Business Risk with Single Sign-On, other benefits include:

• Reducing time spent re-entering passwords for the same identity
• Can support conventional authentication such as Windows credentials (i.e., username/password)
• Reducing IT costs due to lower number of IT help desk calls about passwords
• Security on all levels of entry/exit/access to systems without the inconvenience of re-prompting users
• Centralized reporting for compliance adherence.

Ray notes that when asked to select the important features that would draw motivation for the individuals to use single sign-on, more than 4 in 10 did not identify any of the features as “compelling.” The blog post notes a “demographic skew” of the survey data indicating that 32 percent of the young adults answered “not interested” in comparison to 55 years and older individuals who responded with a 52 percent uninterested. However, there is still an indication that there is a significant indifference demonstrated by consumers.

Ray suggests that marketers still consider implementation of single-ID profiles pointing out that although there are consumers that do not see the benefits, there is a group of people who do. She highlights this fact by the recent announcement from Facebook Connect that indicated that there were approximately 60 million Facebook users using Facebook Connect across as many as 80,000 websites. Ray also suggests that marketers place focus on the user needs and experience which will in turn help consumers realize the benefits.

One driving factor that may drive consumer concern with single sign-on draws attention to the idea that consumers do not want their single-ID associated with and financial data.

Click here to read Augie Ray’s blog post in its entirety.

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