BBC Breakfast guest defends Charlie Stayt against Naga Munchetty's questioning

12 January 2024 , 16:54

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BBC Breakfast guest defends Charlie Stayt against Naga Munchetty's questioning

BBC Breakfast presenter Charlie Stayt encouraged co-host Naga Munchetty to change her line of questioning on the show this morning, before a guest came to his defence.

Charlie, 61, and Naga, 48, fronted the BBC show together on Friday morning. The colleagues discussed a number of topics with guests during the latest episode of the programme. This included a discussion about cyber security within the first hour of the breakfast show. During the segment, Charlie and Naga asked questions to a guest about the topic, which was about finding a safer alternative to using passwords.

Charlie Stayt (centre) and Naga Munchetty (right) were joined by Tom Cheesewright (left) on the latest episode of BBC Breakfast (BBC)

Technology commentator Tom Cheesewright was invited into the studio to discuss passkeys. They offer a new way to sign into apps and websites, using a fingerprint, face scan or PIN, for example, as opposed to remembering passwords.

Attempting to get clarification on the method, Charlie asked the guest: "I'll need to have done a fingerprint on my phone and I'll have to do that every time in order to get to the passkey to enter the website that I'm trying to get into?"

Tom, however, noted that "you never see the passkey" itself, which is generated for people. He then told Charlie: "All you do is put your thumbprint on the phone and the website unlocks. Everything else is handled by the machines."

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Responding with a query, Charlie said: "So once I've ... say I wake up in the morning [and] switch my phone on. To get the phone going I use my thumbprint. Someone gets hold of my phone then they've got full access to everything?"

Addressing the suggestion, Tom stated: "Only if they've got your thumbprint." And after Charlie responded that he would have "done it already" in that scenario, the guest told him: "It locks again and you'll have to re-enter it again."

Tom joined the show's co-hosts on Friday morning for a segment that was centred on cyber security (BBC)

Tom went on to share that some services may require a passkey more frequently than others. Adding as an example: "Your bank is going to challenge you regularly to make sure that it is you."

Turning to her co-host, Naga said: "But you use your pass ... you use your thumbprint don't you or your passcode everytime you log onto your phone, you turn on your phone?" Charlie appeared to respond: "I don't use mine."

Naga added: "But it locks yeah, even if you have to use..." Charlie then said: "Well we're not gonna talk about mine. We're not are we? Cause that's not..." Naga quickly assured: "No, no, no genuinely I'm trying to figure [it out]."

Just moments after Charlie seemingly encouraged his colleague Naga to change her direction of questioning, Tom reacted in support of the former. He teased after laughing over the exchange: "Let's not turn Charlie into a target!"

BBC Breakfast airs each morning from 6am on BBC One and BBC iPlayer. You can catch up on the latest episode of the show through the streaming platform now.

Joel Leaver