How To Enable Optional 2FA

You need a 2FA app on your phone (Authy is good) then go to the wordfence login security page, on your 2FA app go to add new account, scan the QR code in Wordfence, the app with give you a 6 digit code, in wordfence yo will see a box to the right where you enter this code and submit, you will get a pop up to download recover codes, (i think you accept that) then 2FA should be active.

Hi @samsem

To set up 2FA for yourself as an admin then please follow our guide below:

https://www.wordfence.com/help/tools/two-factor-authentication/

@611design Hi! Yes, I did all of those things, but when I go to login as normal, the 2FA doesn’t show up. It just lets me log in without it.

@wfphil Thanks, I did go through that, but it’s not asking me to use 2FA even though I set it up. I think it’s because it’s listed as “optional”, which I want to keep as optional, but I also want to have it set up for my account.

On the settings page does it show as active? and if you look on the general wordpress users does it show 2FA as active against your login?

@611design On WP users page it is listed as “inactive”. On the plugin setting page it is listed as “optional” for my account and inactive.

I would try making it making it required for admin and see what that shows.

Its sound like it has not been activated properly when setup so if making it required does not work i would try removing the 2FA and trying again.

@611design I probably should have mentioned that I did that before, but it worried me that I was going to be locked out because I was listed in the “locked out” section for admins. After seeing that, I reverted it back to optional. I think the optional option is what is causing this problem. I can’t find anywhere in the help documentation that describes the process for turning on or logging in if it’s listed as optional.

Im not really sure what the ‘option’ option is for either ??

If you are showing as locked out is it because your grace period expired after setting the 2FA up if it was left as optional? I would reset and try again. If you have the recover codes i think they help you to gain acceess if you get locked out.

I usually just FTP (or file manager) to the server and rename the wordfence folder if i have access issues as that disables it.

I would try turning it all off and starting again.