A Few Steps to Creating Stonger Passwords

We all have those moments when we try to login to online accounts and the website says password invalid or we are trying to create a new password and that little bar says Password: Weak.  It happens to me on a near daily basis which is why I recently subscribed to a password manager, Last Pass and it has been a huge help.

With today being World Password Day, it is important you understand why creating secure and hard to “break” passwords is important to the safety of your business. Here are some password creation tips for your personal and business accounts that will help keep them safe and secure.

1. Passwords should contain alphabetic, numeric, and special characters
2. Passwords should include both upper and lower case letters
3. Passwords should have 10 or more characters
4. Should not be the word password
5. Does not include your birth date, anniversary date, or any other special well known date
6. Does not include the year
7. Should not include names of individuals in your life (i.e. children, wife, husband)
8. Should always be different from the previous password used

Along with passwords, many websites allow you to create and answer security questions for those times when you may forget your login information.  There are some important items to remember for these as well:

1.  Do not choose questions where the answers can be found doing a simple search on Google (your mother’s maiden name or your birth month).
2. Security questions should be something you can easily remember and will not change twenty years from now. (favorite colors, foods, movies can often change over time)
3. Security questions should be something unique to you.
4. There is only one right answer as it pertains to you individually but there are a thousand possibilities for a hacker to try.

Celebrate World Password Day the right way by changing and updating your current passwords to ones that meet these guidelines above.