A complex password will typically help reduce the chances of your password being guessed or cracked by a hacker or hacking program. Your overarching goal with each element you use in the password creation process is to increase a password’s complexity. “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone” would become “hpatss,” which you could then randomize and use as part of a password. For example, use the first letter in each of the words of your favorite song, movie, or book title. This could include shortening words in your password by a letter, replacing vowels in words, or creating your own formula. RandomnessĪn added layer of security could be using a certain level of randomness for a password. A frequent hacking strategy is to employ a dictionary attack to crack passwords, which systematically uses common words to guess a password. Similar to avoiding personal information, it’s also important to avoid using common words or phrases that you might find in a dictionary. births in 1980, which is more than three million reasons not to use “1980” in a password. For example, there were over 3.5 million U.S. This helps to create a common reference point for people trying to crack your password. People tend to use things they can easily remember for their passwords, but those things often overlap with what other people use. No personal informationĪvoid using anything related to you, including the year you were born, your birth month, your phone number, your home address, your maiden name, your pet’s name, and more. Keep in mind that not every website allows all uses of symbols, though the website will typically tell you what symbols are available to use during the account creation process. Similar to using numbers, adding symbols will help boost the complex nature of a password. Additional layers of complexity could help thwart brute force attacks, or hacking attempts that try every combination of numbers, letters, and symbols available. If there are both numbers and letters involved, that’s one more factor of complexity. The main design behind a strong password is to make it as hard to crack as possible. If you’re accustomed to only using letters in your passwords, it’s time to add some numbers as well. This means a person or a program now has to try more combinations of a password since they have to account for any letter potentially being uppercase or lowercase. Mixing in both uppercase and lowercase letters helps improve the complexity of your password. Keep in mind that certain websites might limit the number of characters you’re allowed to use, but using at least 12 characters is a good starting point. This is because it could make it more difficult for someone to guess your password or take longer for a program to decipher it. In general, the longer your password, or the greater the number of characters, the better. These elements might not offer the best protection alone, but together they could help improve your password security: Character countĬharacters are the letters, digits, and symbols that make up a password. This could include making your password longer and using a mix of numbers and letters. To help create a strong password, consider how different elements work together to offer more security. Depending on the types of online services you use, a password could be the key to unlocking your bank account and credit card information or personal information such as your phone number or home address. Other ways to keep your online information safeĬreating a strong password is often the first step to learning how to stay safe online. In this article What do good passwords look like?
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