How to create a strong password?

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You probably heard at some point of your life that a strong password is very important but what exactly makes a password strong and what makes it easily hackable?

What shouldn’t be in a password?

Let’s start with passwords that you shouldn’t use. It may seem like common knowledge but it turns out that many people still use passwords that are very easy to guess. According to Mashable, the most popular passwords in 2018 were “123456”, “password” and “123456789”. If one of those passwords is what you are using right now, please change it for your own safety. In addition, the things that you should never put in a password are your own name as well as your pet’s name or your children’s name (don’t use names in general because that are easy to guess), don’t use the date of your birthday or wedding (just like a name this information is easy to check). The last but not least thing that you should avoid is using the same password for many websites. Why? The answer is simple. According to Intego “this is the main reason why cyber-criminals want to harvest passwords. If they get a user name and password and then find that it works on other web sites, they can usurp your identity, and perhaps even liquidate your assets”.

How to create a strong password?

Now that we have learned how our passwords shouldn’t look like, let’s see how we can create a strong one. According to Webroot “the secret to creating a hard-to-crack password that’s unique and easy to remember is to focus on making it memorable and making it hard to guess”. It is also stated that you should “use a phrase and incorporate shortcut codes or acronyms”. It can be, for example, a quote that you like but written using a code. What that means is that, for instance, instead of using the word “great” you use “gr8”. Another tip shared on Webroot’s website is that you should “use passwords with common elements, but customized to specific sites”. This method makes it much easier to remember passwords on different websites while making sure that you don’t repeat them. The last advice presented in the article is that you should “play with your keyboard” which means using different symbols and emoticons.

Now that you know what you should and shouldn’t do, go check if your passwords are strong enough.

 

References:

https://mashable.com/article/most-common-passwords-2018/?europe=true

https://www.intego.com/mac-security-blog/4-types-of-passwords-you-shouldnt-create-unless-you-want-your-account-hacked/

https://www.webroot.com/in/en/resources/tips-articles/how-do-i-create-a-strong-password

3 thoughts on “How to create a strong password?

  1. Egor Fiodarau says:

    I have a feeling like this has been already discussed here. Nonetheless, it is true that many Internet users utilize weak passwords and according to annual studies performed by Kaspersky Research, weak passwords are not going away anytime soon.

    • Maciąg Agnieszka says:

      As you mentioned, weak passwords are still ubiquitous across the internet. To my mind, we should popularize the subject of creating strong passwords (and worth mentioning, in this case, are two-factor or multi-factor authentications) at all costs. We usually tend not to realize how easy it is to steal somebody’s password, and I couldn’t agree more with the article’s highlight on setting different passwords for different accounts. The same password to several accounts should be added to the seven deadly sins.

  2. Chepinska Sofiia says:

    Great post! Strong password is really not that hard to create, but it will save you a lot of nerves in case someone decides to hack your account, they simply would not be able to guess something like ” kr91hcTujs35xSK6f”.

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