Following a change Fidelity made last year to eliminate "screen scraping" (collecting data to use elsewhere) by third party financial service providers, Fidelity, one of the largest retirement asset management companies, announced last week that the company will begin taking steps to prevent third party platforms reliant on credential sharing from accessing and taking action in customer accounts held at Fidelity.

"Credential sharing presents security risks to our customers, particularly when it enables third parties to take high-risk actions, such as executing trades within the accounts," read Fidelity's announcement. Fidelity also sent letters to advisors that it intends to block their ability to access and manage clients' 401(k) accounts via credential sharing.

"We anticipate these changes will be minimally disruptive to participants," continues the announcement. "Their login experience will remain unchanged. However, they may need to communicate with any outside advisor with whom they work to ensure account transactions are managed as intended given accounts may no longer be accessible by advisors via certain third-party platforms as Fidelity begins this transition."