Whether you are doing work online or you are creating a work profile that you need to make sure is kept safe, you’ll find that there are plenty of reasons why you need to make sure that the passwords that you choose are difficult to guess and safe. Even the facts that you might think are secure are often not nearly as safe as you think, so make sure that you think about what you can do to ensure that the first line of defense for your data is a good one.
Remember that a good password can deter the casual snooper quite easily, and generally, that will be all that you need to worry about. When you think about the fact that an astonishing 80% of security breaches are caused by bad passwords, you can easily see why it is so important to make sure that you have thought about what this means to you. Many people select simple passwords because they don’t believe that they can remember a longer, more complicated one, but the truth is, it is easy.
When putting together a safe password, there are several things that you should make sure that you avoid. First, don’t make the password the same as the username and don’t a simple name or simple word. Avoid using common abbreviations and don’t use anything like a job title, a phone number or your initials. These things can be quite easy to find and many people will try them if they are trying to get into your system. Another common password that is easily cracked is an in-order sequence of keyboard keys, like QWERTY.
To make a good password, think about using a combination of numbers and letters, but make sure that it is adequately mixed and that you use both capital and lower case letters. You’ll find that while adding “1” to the end of a password might not provide much protection, adding something “249” might work out quite well. You might want to replace letters with numbers that match them, like 1 for L or I, or 0 for the letter O. To come up with the body of an email, try making an acronym out of a famous quote or poem. For instance, the line “Tell them in Sparta, You who pass by,” could be abbreviated to “TtiSYwpb,” which is quite complicated and tends to ensure that your security is of a significantly higher level than if you were to only use “Sparta1.”
Remember that, at the end of the day, you should also rotate your passwords. Take the time to change your passwords regularly, and make sure that you are in a good place to secure your data and your own security, whether it is for your email, your online bank account or your work!
Also find out How to Report Email Scams by reading this post.