Creating the perfect password
As technology takes an increasingly dominant role in our lives, online safety and digital security become more important with every passing day. The rise in online shopping, social media, and information sharing means you’ve likely got multiple online accounts – all of which are protected by a password. Password hacking is one of the most common ways data thieves will attempt to steal your information – so password security is a must.
But how do you actually make a strong password? Here are some simple steps.
Password length matters
Most sites will require you to create a password that’s at least over six characters long. If there’s an upper limit of characters, twelve, for example, it’s always wise to use up that limit. Make sure the password is a mixture of lower and upper case letters, mixed with some numbers.
Use password generators
Developing a complex password yourself can be hard, as humans tend to like logic and patterns. A password generator will generate a random password for you that is just that, random. Data thieves can’t use personal information to guess your password if it has been truly randomly generated.
Keep different passwords
If a data thief guesses one password, and you use that password for everything, then naturally they’re going to have access to everything. Of course, you don’t want to memorise multiple strings of complex characters, so you should take advantage of password managers that do the hard work for you.
Two factor authentication
A growing number of services now offer two-factor authentication. It works simply – when you try and log in, a code is sent to a device associated with your account, which you then input before being allowed to log in. It not only makes it harder to hack but also serves as a warning for unauthorised access attempts
Using common sense
There are many technical methods of creating a strong password – but one of the best remains to simply use your common sense. Don’t share your passwords with anyone, especially over any sort of digital platform. Many passwords are accessed after being shared via text, email, or DM.
A strong password is all that stands between you and the data thieves – it’s worth investing the effort to make sure you have one. If you’d like more help, information, or guidance, contact San-IT today.
