The Department of Electronic & Computer Engineering at the University of Portsmouth has conducted a technology exploration project which includes an evaluation of Authernative’s AuthGuard(R) user authentication product and its related patents. Among the highlights, the study notes: “It is extremely tough to list the weaknesses and threats of the AuthGuard authentication system. This is primarily because AuthGuard utilizes many different protocols, each of which protects against the threats and weaknesses of the others. AuthGuard is also being continually updated with many patents pending. A new patent was granted, #7,299,356, on November 26th, 2007 (Finextra, 2007b) which further enhances the single-session symmetric key protocol which AuthGuard utilizes.”