password: Passwords in Real Life: Don’t be Lazy
- 08/06/15 11:56 PM
It’s tough being responsible sometimes. And managing responsibilities for what is precious in your life usually takes a little extra thought. Let’s say you’ve just welcomed a beautiful set of triplets into the world. Lucky you . . . and lots to managed! But, you wouldn’t give all these babies the same name simply to make it easier to remember, right?
Consider this same concept as you manage other precious aspects of life, like your on line accounts. It may seem convenient – and easier to remember — to use the same password for all accounts.
But a single password across all accounts … (4 comments)
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password: Don't Rely on the Password Reset
- 07/24/15 11:46 PM
Think about your keychain. It probably holds the necessities: car keys, home keys, work keys, miscellaneous keychains you bought on your previous vacations. Now, imagine you have a keychain full of these keys that all look the same, but each only opens a specific door.
Sounds kind of like your list of passwords, right? But what happens when you have all of these keys, and you need to get into your house? In either situation it can be easy to forget which key, or password, goes to what door or website.
So, back to the locked door situation, what do you do? A … (0 comments)
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password: Don’t Name Your Dog After Your Password
- 07/14/15 11:48 PM
Recently I got a puppy for my child. We decided to name the puppy 4wgu23x5#9. My wife,8yysH3m, thought we should name the dog 0x2%#b5. But I’m sure she’ll get over it. Meanwhile, I’m helping my older child with setting up a few social media accounts, and I suggested the two passwords: Rover and Spot.
Is there something wrong with this picture?
Of course! But this picture replays itself millions of times over all the time, as people name their passwords after their pets, family members or favorite sports teams. Don’t do online what you wouldn’t do in real life.
When creating passwords remember that … (4 comments)
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password: 5 Online Security Tips You need to know
- 04/26/15 03:56 AM
It’s up to the potential victim—the user—YOU—to make your computer or smartphone very difficult for Joe Hackster to infiltrate.
Passwords
Being that cyber crime has been a fixture of modern living for over a decade, you’d think that everyone and his brother would know to use strong, long passwords, and a different password for each account. But people—including those who’ve been around for a long time—continue using the same password and ridiculously weak passwords, like password1 and princess. A very strong password will go a long way in preventing hacking incidents. It should be at least 12 characters and a mixed salad … (6 comments)
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password: Lost your Master Password, do This
- 04/20/15 11:11 PM
You have a master password, from your password manager, for 28 accounts. Life has been so easy since!
But then you lose this master password. First off, you can’t fix this like you would if you forgot your password for PayPal or your credit card’s site. Plus, each password manager service has a different solution.
Yet how do you lose a master password in the first place? If it’s impossible to remember,then it may not be a good master password, regardless it should be written down somewhere in a secret location.
Lifehacker.com explains the requirements for various password manager services if you actually lose … (1 comments)
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password: Go Two-Factor or go Home
- 04/12/15 11:11 PM
Logins that require only a password are not secure. What if someone gets your password? They can log in, and the site won’t know it’s not you.
Think nobody could guess your 15-character password of mumbo-jumbo? It’s still possible: A keylogger or visual hacker could obtain it while you’re sitting there sipping your 700-calorie latte as you use your laptop. Or, you can be tricked—via a phishing e-mail—into giving out your super strong password. The simple username/password combination is extremely vulnerable to a litany of attacks.
What a crook can’t possibly do, however, is log into one of your accounts using YOUR phone … (5 comments)
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password: Password Security vulnerable to Trickery
- 03/23/15 11:10 PM
There’s only one entrance to the house: a steel door two feet thick. If someone from the outside touched the door—even with a battering ram—they’ll get an electric shock. No bad guys could get through, right?
Well, suppose the bad guy tricks the homeowner into opening the door…and once open, the bad guy strangles the homeowner. Do you see what happened? All that security is worthless if the homeowner can be tricked. And the same goes for passwords. You can have the longest, strongest, most gibberish password around…but if you allow yourself to be skunked by a hacker…it’s over.
Think you … (1 comments)
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password: If You use these Passwords, You will get hacked
- 01/21/15 09:02 PM
Have you heard of iDict? It’s a tool that hackers can use to get passwords via what’s called brute force attacks. It’s designed to crack into iCloud’s passwords, and supposedly it can circumvent Apple’s anti-brute force attack security.
But iDict doesn’t have as big a bite as you might think. A long, strong password is no match for iDict. But if you have a password that’s commonly used (yes, hundreds of people may have your exact passwords; you’re not as original as you think), then it will be a field day for iDict.
Some examples of passwords that iDict will … (2 comments)
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password: Fingerprint hacked by a Photo
- 01/19/15 09:18 PM
You can’t change your fingerprint like you can change your password. But why would you want to change your fingerprint? The thought might cross your mind if your fingerprint gets stolen.
How the heck can this happen? Ask Starbug. He’s a hacker who demonstrated just how this could happen at an annual meeting of hackers called the Chaos Communication Congress, says an article at thegardian.com. His “victim” was defense minister Ursula von der Leyen.
Starbug (real name Jan Krissler) used VeriFinger, a commercial software, with several photos of von der Leyen’s hands taken at close range. One of the photos … (19 comments)
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password: What is Pharming?
- 12/14/14 09:00 PM
I was surfing on YouTube the other day and found this hilarious video mash-up of Taylor Swift’s song “Shake It Off” and an 80s aerobics video. For a lot of kids today, mash-ups are all the rage—whether it’s combining two videos, two songs, or two words.
Mash-ups have even caught on in the tech world. The word pharming is actually a mash-up of the words phishing and farming. Phishing is when a hacker uses an email, text, or social media post asking for your personal and financial information. On the other hand, pharming doesn’t require a lure. Instead of fishing for users, the hacker … (5 comments)
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password: 10 tips to Secure Passwords
- 11/19/14 09:08 PM
Ever wonder just how hackers bust into systems and cause destruction? One reason is because people are still using weak passwords. While your pet’s name and wedding anniversary dates are easy to remember and sentimental to use, this approach makes a hacker’s job all too easy. Here are 10 things you should know about passwords.
Never use the same password more than once, because if that account is hacked, and that password is for three other accounts, you’ll get quadruple-hacked. Think of a memorable phrase, then abbreviate it, such as, “My all time favorite movie is Jaws which I’ve seen … (2 comments)
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password: 3 Stupid Simple Tips to protect your Identity
- 10/21/14 10:55 PM
For anyone who goes online, it’s impossible to hack-proof yourself, but not impossible to make a hacker’s job extremely difficult. Here are three things to almost hack-proof yourself.
Two-factor authentication. Imagine a hacker, who has your password, trying to get into your account upon learning he must enter a unique code that’s sent to your smartphone. He doesn’t have your smartphone. So he’s at a dead-end.
The two-factor authentication means you’ll get a text message containing a six-digit number that’s required to log into your account from someplace in public or elsewhere. This will surely make a hacker quickly give … (4 comments)
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password: How to Secure Your iCloud
- 09/03/14 02:42 AM
By now you’ve heard that Jennifer Lawrence’s (and other celebs’) cellphone nude pictures were leaked out, but how in the heck did the hacker pull this off? Tech experts believe it was through the “Find My iPhone” app.
Someone anonymously posted nude photos of Jennifer Lawrence and Kate Upton to the 4Chan site, and the stars confirmed the photos were of them.
It’s possible that the hacker/s discovered a vulnerability in the Find My iPhone service. This app helps people locate missing phones via cloud. hackers use a “brute force” program to protect hack accounts. These programs make repeated guesses … (1 comments)
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password: Change Your Password. World Password Day
- 05/09/14 10:35 PM
We also say we want to be safe online. Yet sometimes our actions betray our words—especially if we’re using simple, short passwords for our online sites. Passwords with less than eight characters are the easiest to crack, especially if they include a proper noun or a word that’s in a dictionary. Hackers especially love passwords of all one character. Lose the “ilovedogs” password please.
Take a look at your passwords. Are they simple and include an actual word, or are they long and unique? World Password Day. Take the pledge and change your passwords.
And don’t balk about changing your passwords; … (7 comments)
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password: New year, new Passwords, here’s how
- 01/28/14 08:17 PM
You must change your passwords like you must change your bed sheets. This is not up to negotiation, thanks to the influx of viruses, malware, phishing sites and key loggers.
Changing a password means having a new password for all of your accounts rather than using the same password. Imagine what would happen if someone got ahold of your one password—they could get into all of your accounts.
The biggest problem with passwords as far as how easy they can be cracked, is when they have fewer than eight characters, and are an actual word that can be found in … (1 comments)
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password: Lessons learned from a password attack
- 01/03/14 08:16 PM
It’s easy for millions of passwords to be stolen via hacking into Facebook, Twitter and Gmail accounts: It recently happened because malware was unknowingly downloaded into computers worldwide that extracted log-in information. The data was then directed to the hackers’ server, which was tracked to the Netherlands.
A password is never 100 percent secure, but instead, more or less secure than others. Passwords can be cracked in many ways:
Cracking security questions. It seems that most people use easily-traceable names for their secret question when registering a password, such as names of family members and schools they attended. This information … (19 comments)
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password: Yahoo! Hacked: 15 Tips To Better Password Security
- 08/06/12 02:59 PM
In light of the Yahoo Voices hack where 450,000 passwords have been compromised, it’s time again to let the world know what they are doing wrong when it comes to passwords. CNET pointed out that:
2,295: The number of times a sequential list of numbers was used, with “123456″ by far being the most popular password. There were several other instances where the numbers were reversed, or a few letters were added in a token effort to mix things up.
160: The number of times “111111″ is used as a password, which is only marginally better than a sequential list of … (1 comments)
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It’s tough being responsible sometimes. And managing responsibilities for what is precious in your life usually takes a little extra thought. Let’s say you’ve just welcomed a beautiful set of triplets into the world. Lucky you . . . and lots to managed! But, you wouldn’t give all these babies the same name simply to make it easier to remember, right?
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