How to create a strong password

We often see in the news reports of hackers stealing personal information by targeting usernames, passwords, and security questions.

Extra care must be taken when choosing passwords to ensure that personal data is protected.

There are numerous ways that hackers can assess accounts.

A popular method entitled ‘Brute Force’ sees hackers collect a dictionary of all words and commonly used passwords.

They then cycle through all possible passwords until they gain access to the account.

However, hackers can use a more complex method in which they try every key combination in the effort to find the correct password.

Due to the overwhelming number of possible combinations, it can take several hours, days, or months to successfully uncover a password.

A lot of users think their password is safe because a hacker can only make 3 attempts to guess what it is before the account is locked.

However, some hackers can break onto a website’s server and download password files, which can then be decrypted to reveal user login details.

How to create a strong password

The stronger your password, the more protected your account will be from hackers and various malicious software.

But what makes a strong password?

• Users are advised to create a password with 8 characters or more
• It shouldn’t contain your name or your username
• Should not contain a complete word
• Is different from all other passwords
• Has a varied amount of characters, lowercase, uppercase, numbers and symbols

Another effective way to make an unsolvable password is to create an acronym of an easy-to-remember phrase and incorporate some of the tips above.

For instance, the phrase ‘my birthday is the 2^nd of September’ could be ‘Mb1T2o$’

Alternatively, your password could be a phrase or sequence of intentionally misspelled words.

How to avoid creating an obvious password

Weak passwords are any passwords that can be easily guessed.

Hackers can effortlessly source personal information such as children’s names, pet names, dates of births, etc. from social media and various other places.

The more information a hacker knows about you, the greater the chance on average of them figuring out your password.

In summary, a weak password is:

• Short
• Found in a dictionary
• Personal to you
• Has no varied characters

If you are considering changing all of your passwords to make them stronger and more diverse, the best way of keeping them safe is to memorise them.