[call for action] IB is forcing 2FA

[ZBZB]

You still have the gold credit card? Mine ran out of battery after I turned on by accident and didn't realize it. And since then IB has refused to replace it for me and instead forced me to receive their SMS text as the extra step for authentification. I thought this is fine. Why does IB still want us to use their freaking app? I don't want to download their stupid app's.

That would be a problem for me as I have multiple family accounts.

 

[Sekiyo]

What if I break my phone ?
I can’t log into the desktop anymore ?

 

[HobbyTrading]

My experience is similar to @rb7. I use IB Gateway, shut it down every Friday night, and restart it every Sunday night. I need to use 2FA at the restart on Sunday night. For the rest of the week IB Gateway restarts automatically at 9:45PM (configured) but does not need 2FA. Only once since February has a problem occurred where I needed to manually restart and reenter 2FA during the middle of the week.

I have a similar setup: start my automated trading system on Sunday evening and log on to Gateway with a challenge-response system *). Then I let it run for the entire week until the next Saturday, when I switch it off. Gateway automatically restarts itself every day, at a time specified by me. I don't recall Gateway ever failing to do so.

*) The challenge-response system gives two random serial numbers on screen (1~224) and I have to provide the correct code for these, reading from a credit-card sized plastic card. No app on my phone, finger prints, or stuff like that.

 

[rb7]

do you keep gateway for the whole week or restart gateway every day?

Just restarting it on Mondays morning.
The rest of the week, I don't do anything special and it keeps running.

 

[rb7]

Except there are many instances where IB connection fails and you get a "please re-login" message middle of the day. Aren't you required to do 2FA then?
Imagine you're asleep and have many active positions waiting to be closed. Before it was no issue - IBCAlpha would monitor the connection and login eventually, now you're dead with a lot of exposure.

This effectively destroyed reliable fully automated trading with IB.

In 15 years, I don't recall having to reconnect mid-week, I mean with manual re-login.

 

[TheDawn]

What if I break my phone ?
I can’t log into the desktop anymore ?

You will have to call IB for them to provide you with alternative methods of authentification while you get a new phone or have your current one repaired.

 

[ETJ]

I'll bet this becomes a FINRA requirement by 24 or 25.

 

[windwave]

Well, I have experienced several outage this year:
Gateway shuts off by itself
2 times lost of NBBO update while historical data is ok.
If no 2FA required, all problems like above can be solved by automated monitoring and restart. Even providing a variety of 2FA methods can be helpful, not just the mobile app.

 

[globalarbtrader]

This would be extremely annoying... except IB already made it impossible to use IBC to log in every day - instead like a lot of people I have to log in once a week. So given the current situation, having to use 2FA once a week to log in isn't really that burdnesome. And there are at least 2, maybe 3, ways you can do it: old fashioned plastic card, fancy gold card if you have it and the batteries are still going, and phone app.

Having to login once a week isn't really that burdensome. OK, it annoys me specifically because I often go on holiday for several weeks leaving my computer trading, and it isn't on the cloud so I can't remotely login, but I'm guessing I'm a corner case.

GAT

 

[HobbyTrading]

OK, it annoys me specifically because I often go on holiday for several weeks leaving my computer trading, and it isn't on the cloud so I can't remotely login, but I'm guessing I'm a corner case.

For this use-case am I using Teamviewer because it works on both Linux (Ubuntu) and iPad. I enable it on my Linux trading server at home before I leave and then do the weekend re-logon remotely from the iPad. There is one big caveat though: This does NOT work on Ubuntu 22.04! Make sure that your Linux box uses an older version of the Ubuntu OS.