The Modern Password

Transcript· EN

The modern password. We've been using passwords on computers for 60 years. During that time, we've gotten lots of advice about how to make and use passwords. Much of that advice is now completely outdated. A lot can change in 60 years. Our passwords have been stolen in bulk during security breaches. The bad guys buy and sell our passwords every day. And they've up their game using automated attacks that guess passwords billions of times a second. I'm so old and tired, I can't protect anyone like I used to. If your passwords look this frail, tired and ineffective, it's time to put the latest advice into action and beef up your passwords. Introducing the modern password. Notice, he's tall, strong and unique. And he's ready to help protect you online. Don't try to memorize them, because now you can't memorize a password strong enough to resist the bad guys' hacking attacks. The modern password should be 12 to 16 characters in length and as information dense as possible. So, no dictionary words, pets' names, or sports teams. Include uppercase letters, lowercase letters, numbers and special characters. Don't capitalize the first letter of your password, but add some capital letters in the middle or at the end. Using substitutions for certain characters, or leet speak is now massively outdated and doesn't make your password stronger. Don't add a number or special character to the end of your password, that's too predictable. Sprinkle numbers and special characters randomly throughout the middle of your password, like this. Memorizing passwords just doesn't work well enough today. So use a standalone password manager, or the one built into your browser. Another option is to write your passwords down and store them securely, which is a great idea. Top security experts have encouraged this for years. The British GCHQ strongly encourages small businesses to provide secure storage for their employees' written passwords. So, a locking drawer or a locking file cabinet could be a great option to securely store your written passwords. Passwords are like underwear. Don't leave them lying around where people can see them. Keep them out of sight and a little mysterious. Change them both on an appropriate schedule. And don't share used ones with friends, family or co-workers. While you'd hopefully change your underwear every day, you only need to change your password when you think it's been stolen in a security breach. Passwords aren't going away anytime soon. So, let's all use modern passwords that are strong, unique and keep all of us safer online. Loyster. Brilliant information security.