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Password Mania

We are bringing this tip out of the archives because remembering passwords and having strong passwords is more important than ever with increased identity theft and the increased amount of business we conduct over the web.

I have accumulated nearly ninety user names and passwords for various email services, web sites, banking sites, etc. Without my password tracking software, I wouldn’t be able to remember them all or, I would be using the same user name and password for every instance (an extremely dangerous practice). You can use software solutions to securely save passwords on your computer or smart phone. For your computer, I recommend these packages for securely keeping track of your passwords (works much better than the sticky note method):

If you use a smart phone, my favorite application is Splash ID. The folks at Splash Data have been making and improving this software for more than 10 years. It is currently available for a Mac or Windows computer, Palm handhelds, Blackberry, iPhone, Windows Mobile phones, and more.

You don’t even have to high tech about it either. You can get some 3X5 cards and a recipe box or a small notebook and track your username and passwords with it. The key is to use something, and keep it up.

If you have trouble thinking of good passwords, some of the programs listed above also double as password generators. Keep these rules in mind when creating passwords:

  • Avoid real words, names, or dates that mean something in your life (birthdays, anniversaries, etc)
  • Make passwords harder to guess by adding punctuation or numbers as in brain*scan or gue55thi5pa55word.
  • Combine the first letters of a common phrase to make your password. For example, you might take the phrase “If elected I promise to lower taxes for all” and turn it into the password “ieip2ltfa”.
  • Change your passwords regularly. That doesn’t mean once a year whether you’ve been attacked or not; it means changing passwords as often as every month for financial sites, or every 3-4 months at a minimum. It’s not as convenient, but convenience and security don’t always go together.
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7 thoughts on “Password Mania”

  1. I put a hint for each password in the Description field of the Properties for the applicable bookmark in Firefox. Right-click on the bookmark, select Properties. Of course, this doesn’t work for most other browsers, as they don’t have a similar field.

    It’s almost as convenient as an online password service; there is no worry about a service being hacked or going out of business; the hints are automatically saved with any bookmark backup; hints rather than passwords lowers the risk of your own computer being hacked.

    1. Excellent idea…very innovative. Make sure you backup your bookmarks. I’m sure you are if you came up with a cool idea like this, though.

  2. Thanks for the security reminder Rick, I’ve been falling victim to the “same password” disease lately, and I know better!

    I’ll checkout these tools you have listed, and get to using them immediately… with over 500 passwords to remember, this should make the job much easier.

    Also like to note that for WordPress, there is a plugin called wp-security (and others) that have a built-in secure password generator to help you out when creating accounts, either in wordpress, or for any other service.

    You can read more about it here: http://semperfiwebdesign.com/custom-applications/wp-security-scan/

    1. Cool plugin for WordPress…thanks. I really like the SplashID app for the iPhone and desktop companion for syncing…redundancy baby! It also includes a password generator.

  3. Rick, Some time ago you introduced me to Robo Form. I’ve been using it ever since and love it.What do you think of it now?

    Duane

    1. I think RoboForm still is a great service. Any password service that is used regularly (and backed up) is better than nothing, but RoboForm has been around a long time and certainly works great.

  4. Went from RoboForm to LastPass (they took ofer RoboForm I believe).

    Learned about RoboForm @ your computer user group meetings (among many other great stuff)
    Chuck

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