Two factor authentication

[peter]

Thinking about it, I’m not at all convinced that keeping tabs open (or not) has anything to do with being logged out of Ancestry. We’ve never kept multiple tabs open permanently on any of our devices at Ancestry (or any other site), but it’s only in the past couple of months I’ve started being logged out occasionally.

It might depend partly on how long it is since you last used Ancestry, but also whether you are using the same IP address. Most broadband connections do not provide a static IP address, but I don't know the circumstances under which it might change.

 

[Pauline]

We don't have a static IP address (though we could pay extra to have one) but it only changes if we get disconnected for some reason, which rarely happens. Ancestry is one of the most frequently used websites in our house, and it's a pretty unusual day if we don't use it all.

 

[peter]

We don't have a static IP address (though we could pay extra to have one) but it only changes if we get disconnected for some reason, which rarely happens. Ancestry is one of the most frequently used websites in our house, and it's a pretty unusual day if we don't use it all.

It may be that it's after one of those unusual days that you find yourself logged-out? My bank account logs me out after 2 minutes - LostCousins gives users 30 days (I think). Ancestry is probably somewhere in between.

 

[Pauline]

It may be that it's after one of those unusual days that you find yourself logged-out?

No, it's definitely not that. We haven't had an unusual day recently, but have been logged out. I suspect it's down to something that happens at Ancestry, and is nothing whatsoever to do with me or my set-up.

 

[peter]

I signed up to 2FA. Big mistake. The email codes take a minimum of 90 minutes to come through. Luckily once on my account having endured repeated waits on numerous occasions I finally turned it off and will not be restarting it. 90 minutes time lag is no use to the user.

Hotmail routinely delay emails which they suspect are spam. I had thought the delay was only 6o minutes, but it may be variable.