Authenticators give surveys all of the benefits of using individual links with an anonymous link.

In this article:

• The Benefits of Authentication
• Creating Authenticators
• Authenticating Respondents Automatically

The Benefits of Authentication

In some cases, your only option for distribution will be to use a survey’s anonymous link. An Authenticator still allows you to have the functionality of individual links when using an anonymous link. This means that only a set list of respondents can take the survey and information stored in a contact list can be appended to response data.

When respondents reach an Authenticator, they are prompted to log in before they can go any further. When creating an Authenticator, you decide the field that respondents must enter—usually an email address. Once respondents attempt to log in, Qualtrics checks your specified contact list for an entry that matches what respondents entered. If there is a match, the authentication is successful and respondents can proceed.

If authentication fails, respondents are prompted to re-enter the required information. If respondents continue to fail, they are skipped past the authenticated section of the survey.

Creating Authenticators

Authenticators are elements in your Survey Flow.

To set up an Authenticator:

1. Open your Survey Flow. Click Add a New Element Here and then click Authenticator.
2. Move the Authenticator to the desired position, which is usually the beginning of your survey, and nest the blocks and elements you want protected under the Authenticator. Any elements not nested can be accessed without authentication.
3. Set the Authentication Type to Contact and select the contact list you want to use during authentication. Only individuals found on this contact list can proceed.
4. Click the drop-down arrow under Authentication Fields to select the contact list field(s) you want respondents to enter for authentication. You can add additional fields by clicking the green plus sign.
5. If desired, add an Optional Label to provide clarification on what respondents should enter.
6. Enable the Password mode to hide the characters respondents type. 

Authenticating Respondents Automatically

Enable the Prefill feature for an authenticating field to pre-populate with the value of an Embedded Data field. If all authenticating fields are set to Prefill, auto-authentication will be attempted. Auto-authentication allows respondents to authenticate without entering any information.

To set up auto-authentication, enable Prefill and type in the name of the Embedded Data field that will be used to authenticate the respondent. 

Prefilling can be achieved in two ways: either by distributing your survey using a contact list that contains the Embedded Data field, or by adding a query stringthat contains the field to an anonymous link. If auto-authentication fails, respondents can authenticate manually.