Vidoop is a User Experience company focused on web security. They offer a set of products and services to provide security to web users and developers, but they take a unique approach to security that provides a much better experience to end users than normal password or captcha systems.

Vidoop provides three main services, all of which are based on the same underlying technology and methodology. The services are:

Vidoop Secure - an all around security portal for your web-based applications
myVidoop - a password manager for individual web users
Vidoop Captcha - a captcha system Vidoop advertises as being bot-proof, but not human proof.

I started using myVidoop for my own browsing / password needs about a month ago after seeing some of the team demo their service. I started off somewhat skeptical of the whole thing - do we really need another password management system? After about five minutes my skepticism died in the fiery glory of fan-boy fanaticism, and it hasn't died down since then. This service makes sense, and it actually works.

myVidoop combines a variety of best practices around security into a single, powerful, well-organized product. For starters, there's single sign-on. We all know that remembering many different passwords is impossible. Most of us have resorted to using the same password over and over, or writing them all down - both necessary results of managing access to multiple internet portals, but both inherently bad for security in obvious ways. Vidoop addresses this concern by making their singly password nearly impossible to hack and then providing you an easy way to shut down your account if it is hacked.

Vidoop accomplishes this by not really using passwords at all. Instead they verify your identity by asking you to pick a series of categories - say, instruments, computers, and automobiles. They then display a series of images and ask you to pick the ones that represent your categories. The sign on screen is something Vidoop calls the "ImageShield", and it looks like this:

The images are never in the same place twice, and the images themselves are randomly chosen from the many images Vidoop has in any category. For example, today your "password" might be ABC and based on pictures of a macbook pro, a violin and a Ford mustang. When you next sign in, it might just as easily be DEF, a based on pictures of an old Cray mainframe, a tuba, and a Honda Pathfinder. By not using the same characters or even the same images, Vidoop makes it nearly impossible for a computer to guess or record your password. Until positronic brains are as good at object identification as ours are, your data is safe.

Vidoop also makes your data secure by not just relying on what you know, but also letting you tie the system to something you have: you can authorize a cell phone to make adjustments to your account settings through either calling into their touch-tone service or texting. Let's say I log in to Vidoop and then have to leave my computer - probably because the building's on fire and I opt to save a baby instead of grabbing my laptop. In the midst of the blaze, some evil secret ninja thief sneaks into the building and steals my laptop. When I realize it's gone, I can text Vidoop from my authorized cell phone and get my account locked down and list my machine as unauthorized.

Vidoop's web portal allows me to authorize or unauthorize different devices and view all of your account activity. You can also make changes to your passwords, change your security categories, and just about anything else you'd expect.

myVidoop logins can also be integrated with Open ID - in fact, Open ID board member and general open-source enthusiast Chris Messina is the head of User Experience at Vidoop. I met most of the Vidoop team at SXSW and they're all really nice people with interesting thoughts. If you're interested in keeping up with them on Twitter, check out Luke Sontag and Scott Kveton along with Vidoop itself.

Vidoop's other services, Captcha and Secure, use the same technology as myVidoop to accomplish different tasks. The captcha is similar to the password system of myVidoop in that it uses the ImageShield, but asks you to identify several categories it gives you rather than some you've chosen earlier. Vidoop Secure uses the cell-phone authorization service to let you provide security to your applications through multiple devices.

In the end, there's no such thing as a perfectly safe system. A hacker with access to your machine could certainly find ways to break Vidoops security, given enough time and enough resources. The compelling thing about Vidoop is that it works much better than any other system I've seen available right now and that it's MORE secure than the alternatives.

Vidoop is also a great example of why user experience matters. Web security is important, but it isn't something I'd probably be this excited about if it weren't for the great user experience Vidoop provides. It's a great reminder of how good user experience can take an otherwise boring task and make it interesting and compelling, and turn disengaged users into loyal fans.

Read more from RJ Owen.