The article starts with this description of 2FA:

> an electronic authentication method in which a user is granted access to a website or application only after successfully presenting two or more distinct types of evidence (or factors) to an authentication mechanism.

and concludes with (emphasis mine):

> For the average user, the smartphone has become a single point of failure, where the theft of one device and one piece of knowledge (the passcode) can lead to total financial compromise.

Looks like 2FA to me, not 1FA.

Furthermore, these days I enter the passcode on my phone very rarely (Android requires it after restarting the device or after some amount of time) - normally I use biometric authentication.

The linked WSJ article is a bit hyperbolic and typical journalism overreach by calling it an Apple "security vulnerability", which is bullshit IMO. If you watch the interview with the guy in jail, the main method by which he got people's security code is he asked them. That is, he would tell people he had drugs to sell them and wanted to give them info, so he would get their phone and ask them for their code to unlock it.

At least the WSJ report is honest when it says "The biggest loophole: You".

Also in-person theft is both something our civilisation understands and has adapted to, and it does not scale. So it's never going to be a problem the way say password re-use is or many other maladies from the use of "passwords" for online security.

Compromising the smartphone can let you get the password though, making it one factor. It would be more 2FA if you entered password on one device and used another (Yubikey, physical totp token) as a second factor.

The issue I'm having with this sort of "something you own and something you know/are" two-factor authentication is that it has some potential to cause violence - both can be beaten out of you: https://www.citizen.co.za/network-news/lnn/article/banking-a...