What is a Strong Password?

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Strong Passwords are Important!

 

login password

 

Having an easy-to-figure-out-password puts individuals at risk for having their personal information compromised and could lead to identity theft.   A recent segment of 60 Minutes revealed the growing problem of cyber-criminal activity online.

In this digital age, it’s important to take security and privacy seriously in order to protect personal information on all of your accounts.  This means having strong and different passwords on each account and putting your personal passwords in a safe location that only you can access.

Talk to your tweens and teens about how important it is to have a strong password for each account that they use and to protect their passwords.  They should treat them like their toothbrush; change them frequently and they shouldn’t share them!

treat passwords like toothbrushes

 

What is a strong password? 

 

It simply means creating a password with a variety of characters, numbers, upper case and lower case text. You can help ensure that you have a strong password by using the following tips.

 

The Ideal Strong Password:

  • includes upper-case letters;  such as B, H, G

  • includes lower-case letters;  such as l, p, q

  • includes numbers; 1, 3 9

  • includes characters/symbols, such as #  $ % &

  • a strong password is a new password, not one previously used;

The Most Commonly Used Passwords:

It’s hard to believe that anyone would be so stupid in this day and age to use the word password as their password… talk about an invitation to get hacked.  Other passwords commonly used are 123456 and qwerty.  Obviously don’t use these!!

Other Password Don’ts

  • don’t use your name;

  • don’t use your user name;

  • don’t use a relative’s name;

  • don’t use your pet’s name;

  • don’t use commonly known info about you or likes/dislikes such as – Chocolate, Boston-Red Sox, Patriots, Bruins (All my personal faves!)

  • don’t use your address;

  • don’t use an obvious run of numbers or letters, such as ABCD, or 123456

  • don’t use an obvious pattern of letters or number sequences, such as ACEGI or 13579

 

Having a strong password is a relatively simple measure that you can teach your kids to stay safe online!