Patent ID: 8453221

Claim:
A method for authenticating a client, comprising: initiating a procedure for creating a password for the client in response to a creation of an account in the name thereof by transmitting a request from the service provider to an authentication authority, determining a password for the client and storing the created password at the authentication authority, generating at the authentication authority upon a login attempt by the client a number of strings of random characters, the number of strings being at least equal to the number of characters in the password and assigning each password character to a specific string, the strings being ordered following the sequence of characters in the password, receiving from the authentication authority the strings to the client and presenting each string of the strings in a different column to the client that allows the client to select each character of the password in a correct order from the respective strings, receiving selections aligning the password characters by displacing or sliding the columns relative to each other without changing an ordering of the characters of the string within its respective column; and verifying the client's password based on the selections aligning the password characters at the authentication authority for the service provider thus enabling upon the verification of the password a sign-on to the account of the client with a service provider.