One embodiment of the present invention provides a system that facilitates confirmation of data communicated to a first device belonging to a first user from a second device belonging to a second user. During operation, the first device receives a message containing data from the second device. The first device then translates the data into a string of words (such as a human-friendly representation using a well-known function such as the One Time Password (OTP) dictionary defined in IETF RFC 1938) that can be recognized by a human. Next, the first device displays the string of words to the first user. The second device also translates the original data using the same well-known function. The first user and the second user then confirm that both strings of words match. The confirmation process is performed through a separate communication channel. This confirmation process ensures that the data sent by the second device is successfully received by the first device, and that it was sent by the second device. That is, this confirmation process provides both integrity checking and authentication on the data sent from the second device to the first device.