Happy World Password Day, ladies and gentlemen! Today is the day where we get reminded about how secure our password can be. It’s the literal key for our account and personal information, as such, we want to make one that’s tough to crack open.
However, not so many people in this day and age really know how safe their passwords actually are. Not to mention, a lot of people don’t really want to bother about its strength, which leads to data breaches that end up compromising information.
As such, today we’ll look at 5 tips I have for people to take into consideration for future password uses. Considering how today is the day where people need to be aware of how secure their passwords are, I hope this advice helps you in your future endeavors.
1.- Enable Two-Factor Authentication where Applicable.
Well, I guess I can start by addressing the elephant in the room. Two-Factor Authentication has become a standard in security. It’s an extra layer of verification that makes sure that the user inputting the password is the actual owner of the password.
The most common use of Two-Factor Authentication can be seen in places such as Steam and Discord. However, we can also see that a lot of websites have started to include 2FA as an actual security measure.
One of my recommended apps that enable Two-Factor Authentication is definitely Google’s Authenticator. This allows users to easily implement 2FA measures by having the security token be in their phone exclusively, as such, you can use your phone as the security measure and have people need to steal that from you in order to crack your password.
2.- Avoid Using the Same Password Twice.
I am guilty of this to some extent but using the same login information in multiple accounts is a big no-no. While it is nice to have one password you can remember for multiple accounts across different websites, once that one’s been cracked the jig is up.
Sadly, when talking about cybersecurity we must make sure we can’t be compromised. As such, we have to take as many measures as possible and passwords really aren’t meant to be easily remembered when it comes to how they work.
While we’re at the topic, I should also suggest against using repeated characters and letter or number sequences. Usually people think they’re pretty clever by using Alphanumerical Passwords but tend to be surprised when they are hijacked because their password was easy to guess because it had a number sequence (Like “123”) on it.
3.- Make Up Your Own Words
This is one that I use for the passwords I use in multiple accounts. Once I realized that a word with simple obfuscation such as “p0w3r” wasn’t going to work. I started making up my own words in order to have passwords that are both easy to remember and tough to crack at the same time.
Of course, this means you’ll have to craft your own language and make up a ton of words like “Mantinopuel” in order to have a pretty secure security code. However, it’s better than using “Nutella” as a password, don’t you think?
Is it random? Yes. That’s because Security often requires randomness in order to make the user’s choice unpredictable and tough to crack. In other words, your password should definitely reflect that you are a very tough cookie to handle.
4.- Always verify your Password’s Strength.
Like I said before, some users tend to think that they are pretty clever when they make their own password but face the grim reality of things once their data has been extracted. As such, it’s always good to verify whether or not the password you’re trying out is strong.
I heavily recommend using websites like HaveIBeenPwnd? or HowSecureIsMyPassword?. Of course, I also recommend taking a little bit more of tweaking like adding numbers and symbols after you’re done verifying that your password is very tough to deal with.
On the note of password strength, a good starter tip is to use Upper and Lowercase letters along with alphanumeric characters and symbols. That way your password becomes a bit tougher to crack, however, that doesn’t mean it becomes completely strong as mentioned before.
5.- A Quick Talk About Password Managers
A lot of people often bring up the use of Password Managers such as Fastlane in order to have a lot of secure passwords across multiple accounts. However, for those who want to save some space on their HDD’s there are some managers that come in the form of Browser Extensions.
The main problem with these is that, in order to access the passwords you are required to use a single password that’s not recorded anywhere at all. As such, it’s going to be tough for someone to remember a very strong password like “UberP455@Influent6872t” or something along those lines.
However, this also offers protection against such things as Keyloggers, Clipboard Loggers and various other memory spying techniques. Not to mention, it also makes users sigh in relief because it will make them need to only remember one password.
Conclusion: The importance of a strong password
I’m going to go and say that in this day and age where data breaches have become more common. It’s pretty important to make sure our passwords are actually very strong and secure.
We definitely need to always think a step ahead of the hackers and to make our information as inaccessible as possible. The only way to do this is to make a key that’s very hard to clone or crack. As such, we do need to take these measure into account.
Now if you excuse me, I’ll begin to make a few strong passwords for my Twitter and other accounts I love to use. Once again, Happy World Password Day, play safe!
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