IPhone – How should I use Two Step and/or Two Factor authentication with many Apple accounts

icloudiphoneSecuritytwo-factor-authenticationtwo-step-authentication

I have the following accounts

  • A personal iCloud account that secures my keychain / Facetime
  • A personal iTunes account
  • A work developer account for the App Store (not shared, I exclusively use it)

Question

How can I enable Two Step, or Two Factor for more than one accounts above?

Background

I have a mid-2012 Retina, a 2016 MacBook Pro, Watch 2, and iPhone 7.

I use the same iCloud account on all devices, therefore I can only use two factor authentication for one account listed above.

When I try to reenabled "two step" authentication for the other accounts, I don't see the option anymore within the idmsa portal.

How do I enable either 2 step, or 2 factor in the above scenarios?

Best Answer

Two-factor authentication

Macworld has a great tip on enabling two-factor authentication for an iTunes-only Apple ID (or any Apple ID not being used as the iCloud account on an iOS device):

  1. Add a new user account on your (or a friend's) Mac.
  2. In the new user account, log into iCloud with your iTunes-only Apple ID.
  3. Enable two-factor authentication (iCloud preference pane > Account Details > Security tab).

It may be a bit cumbersome to switch to this Mac user account though, if you need to manage your Apple ID often.

Macworld also has some tips on using your trusted phone number(s) to receive verification codes when you don't have a trusted device nearby.

Two-step verification

It may no longer be visible in the Apple ID web management interface, but you can still enable two-step verification if you want:

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