One technique I use to enter long, complex passwords (which we should all be using) is to open Notepad from the Accessories menu and type the password there. Since we only see the asterisks (*) when we enter passwords, it can be extremely difficult to accurately type in some passwords with mixed case, numbers and other characters. The problem doubles when we have to enter a password two times in a row. Here's how I use the Notepad trick to circumvent this sometimes frustrating procedure:
1. Open Notepad from the Accessories menu
2. Type out the password and verify its accuracy
3. Highlight the password with the mouse
4. Copy it using your favorite method (Ctrl+C, Edit –> Copy, RIGHT click and copy, etc)
5. Go to my web form or wireless security password box and click in the password box to get the cursor positioned there
6. Paste the password there using your favorite method (Ctrl+V, Shift+Insert, Edit –> Paste, RIGHT Click and Paste, etc)
That's it! Remember that you can paste the password as many times as you want to until you copy something else.
See:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/askjack/2007/may/17/isitmoresecuretocopyand
QUOTE: It’s often convenient to paste in passwords but this would defeat only the simplest keylogging malware. It is trivially easy to capture the contents of the Windows clipboard.
Therefore this could pose a major security risk!!
Not sure what this means…and don’t agree.
But surely a keylogger would record whatever was typed anyway? Losing or forgetting passwords is a bigger risk to the user than anyone else. Security is not an abstract but something that has to be practical enough to work with people.
I agree Roger…a keylogger would not be thwarted by this tip. I meant this tip to be for folk using their own device in a secure and trusted location only. Typing out passwords on a public machine is not a good idea. Thanks for the comment!
How about if your passwords were on a thumb drive? Would not copy/paste from there defeat keyloggers on a public computer? You would “just” have to be very careful with that thumb drive.
Copy and paste is one of the fastest, safest and easiest ways to enter long and complex password, but it has one *Major Flaw*.
Yes trying to remember a complex 20 [minimum] character password [upper, lower, numbers and symbols] , is impossible, but doing the copy in paste, suffers a very simple problem, and that is, when you ‘copy’, that information is stored in your clipboard, and easily accessible to a seasoned hacker.
Solution –
(1.) Clear your clipboard after entering your copy and paste password. Personally, I use a free program called, CCleaner to clean my clipboard immediately after entering into my banks web site.
(2.) For those of you that have replaced your standard Windows clipboard with a fancy 3rd party clipboard manager, that stores dozens or even hundreds of clipboard entries, you are a disaster just waiting to happen, and it’s not a question of *if*, but *when*.
Conclusion –
So get rid of the fancy clipboard program, and clean your clipboard often.
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