It's time to get #password smart!
#TalkNerdyToMeLover's @JenSquard
I did a photo shoot last night for a bunch of ladies, and they were required to give me a password for their online gallery. It was amazing to hear how many of them told me that they used that same password for everything - um, hello? You don’t know me, but now I can get into your email? Not smart.
I understand why we do the same password everything - muscle memory is powerful, so it is hard to retrain your hands to type a new word over and over, and it is less efficient. And we also assume that if we pick a new password we will never remember it. It’s happened to all of us - you had to pick something new for something obscure, then could never access that account again because you couldn’t remember the right combo of letters, numbers and symbols. But give yourself a little credit - we can store TONS of numbers in our head with no problem, so today is the day to get password smart.
1) DO NOT use password for your password. Or one of your kids’ names. Or your beloved dog’s name. OR YOUR NAME!
2) Mix it up. Pick a common word or number, and use that within your password if you really have to, but change it around. If you have a special number (mine is my lunch pin from high school), add it before your initials and after your favorite football team’s color. Make it complex...unless you don’t mind identity theft.
3) Acronyms are everything these days, so make your own! Think of a sentence that means something to you, and use the first letter of every word. Here is an example: I got married on June 1, 2009. Your password would be: IgmoJ1,2009. Who is going to crack that code? Think of a couple of sentences, and if they are things that matter to you, like when you were born, when your children were born, when you lost your virginity, or even a line from your favorite movie, you aren’t going to forget. How about this one: If you try to hack my computer I will find you and hit you with a shovel! Password: IytthmcIwfyahywas! Say the sentence as you type and it really is quite easy.
4) Don’t write your password on a sticky note and stick it to your computer. If someone breaks into your house, they don’t even have to steal something to screw you over. They just have to take pictures of your stuff. Bye bye credit score.
So there you go - use a different password for your important stuff. Email, bank account, Facebook, credit cards. You will remember them. Bad guys will not.