
Discontinuing Support for Clef - nl5874
http://blog.getclef.com/discontinuing-support-for-clef-6c89febef5f3#.eru7jthi2
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sharmi
They have been providing two-factor authentication for websites either as a
plugin to existing frameworks like WordPress or through API.

The users will have to drop everything and scramble to get a stable working
login within the next 3 month, not counting the accounts migration that needs
to happen. Poor ppl.

Seems to be a successful product with plenty of happy paying customers and no
real competitor. Looks like killing a golden egg laying goose. Why would it be
shut down so abruptly? The customers at least deserve a reason.

~~~
eamann
There are a couple of competitors out there. Tozny ([https://tozny.com/secure-
login/](https://tozny.com/secure-login/)) and LaunchKey
([https://launchkey.com/](https://launchkey.com/)) both offer similar
solutions. Both also offer APIs for integration with other products and ship
WordPress plugins (for anyone who needs that particular integration).

So there are options out there, and 3 months is plenty of time to migrate
accounts that need to migrate (I'm sure either of these, and any other
companies offering alternatives, would be happy to help anyone making a
change).

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contrahax
Well, that was sudden. No post-mortem? I thought Clef's whole thing was
transparency/company culture/etc.

~~~
eamann
> Our team will be joining another company, which we’ll have more news about
> in the next few weeks.

Sounds like some kind of acquisition or merger, with a promise of a future
update. In other words, there will be a post-mortem, but they were alerting
everyone to the coming death of the product and the services it depends on as
soon as possible.

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mxstbr
For being a security product that businesses depend on shutting down with a
three month notice seems horrible. A lot of people will have to scramble to
build their own auth system now instead of focusing on the things they should
be focusing on.

It'd be fine given a year to do this, but three months? Harsh.

~~~
__derek__
That's true, but there is precedent: Balanced gave a 90-day period for moving
off its platform before shutting down.[1]

[1]: [https://techcrunch.com/2015/03/13/balanced-is-closing-its-
ma...](https://techcrunch.com/2015/03/13/balanced-is-closing-its-marketplace-
payment-platform-in-90-days-strikes-transition-deal-with-rival-stripe/)

------
Elena_UNLOQ
There's also Unloq: [https://unloq.io/](https://unloq.io/). Wordpress plugin
page:
[https://wordpress.org/plugins/unloq/](https://wordpress.org/plugins/unloq/).
It offers 3 MFA options, transaction authorisation and encrypts all data in
transit and at rest with users' personal encryption keys. Plus, if you lose
your phone or laptop, you can do a remote logout or device deactivation and
your info is safe. It's free up to 100 users/ account, and it's an inexpensive
alternative to Clef.

