This may seem like a very simple article to some of you out there but let me tell you in the “real world” this is a HUGE problem!
Whenever you login to your email account, online banking account, or social media account you are always having to provide some sort of credentials to verify that you are who you say you are. The credentials that you are required to provide might be a username and password or something else. Most people I have seen use very simple passwords like the name of their dog, cat, fish, bird, or whatever with a number or special character after that, because it is required sometimes. The same people who use very simple passwords like the examples I have above also usually use the same password for every account. The sad part about this is that most people think they are secure when in reality you don’t even have to be a hacker to get in to their accounts. That is NOT being secure.
How easy it is For Someone to Get Your Password
If you choose to use weak passwords then you are choosing to simply stay insecure. If you have weak passwords then you don’t have to be the NSA using their TURMOIL systems to get your password or even some so called “hacker” across the street. No… all you have to be is someone that knows you well enough to know that you have a dog named Rusty, for example, to get into your bank account, email account, or even your social media accounts! These people are NOT in any way hackers; these people simply guess your password there is no technical knowledge required. The only knowledge these people need is knowledge about your life and how to guess, that is it!
What You Can Do
The solution to this apparently very complex problem in the “real world” is simple. USE STRONG PASSWORDS! I would recommend creating random passwords for each account you have but I think that might be too extreme for most people so just pick a word out of the dictionary or a sentence out of a book and add in a few special characters, capital letters, and lowercase letters to the word or sentence. If you are old school and do not like to store passwords on your computer for whatever reason then just write your password down for each account in a journal. If you would like to store your passwords the modern way then save them in a text document or if you are using Microsoft Office then save them in an Excel or Word document.
What a Strong Password Should Be Like
A strong password in my own personal opinion should be defined by the characteristics below.
At least 30 – 100+ characters long
Contains uppercase letters
Contains lowercase letters
Contains numbers
Is not your name
Is not your username
Is not a friend’s name
Is not a family member’s name
Is not a word from a dictionary
Is not a common name
Is not a keyboard pattern, such as abcdefghi or 123456789
Contains symbols, such as ` ! ” ? $ ? % ^ & * ( ) _ – + = { [ } ] : ; @ ‘ ~ # | \ < , > . ? /
That is my personal definition of a strong password, you don’t have to go by this (I realize that most people won’t) but keep in mind that the stronger your password is the less likely someone will be able to guess it or be successful while performing a dictionary-based attack or brute force attack.
Thank you all for taking the time to read this post and as always God bless!
Preston Hood
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