Patent ID: 8528045

Claim:
A member authentication method, comprising: receiving, at a security server from a client server, a member authentication request associated with a member attempting to access confidential information from the client server via a first member device associated with the member; determining at the security server a secure key associated with the member, wherein the secure key comprises an ordered sequence of symbols including at least one symbol comprising an image of member-generated content; determining a one-time plurality of symbol sets associate with the secure key, wherein the ordered sequence of symbols is included within the plurality of symbol sets; transmitting data associated with the secure key from the security server to a second member device associated with the member, wherein the data associated with the secure key comprises a matrix having columns and rows, each column in the matrix representing one of the symbol sets, and further wherein said second member device includes a display and a touch screen keypad on said display, wherein a matrix size of said matrix is selected by the security server based at least in part on a size of said display; entering, by the member, using the touch screen keypad, secure key information into the second member device, said secure key information comprises one of: (i) a sequence of matrix row selections entered by the member without including matrix column selections, or (ii) a sequence of matrix column selections entered by the member without including matrix row selections; receiving, at the security server from the second member device, the secure key information; validating the secure key information at the security server; and based on the validated secure key information, authenticating the member; responsive to said authentication, transmitting, by the client server, the confidential information from the client server to the first member device.