We’ve all heard the advice – when setting a password use capital letters, numbers and non-alphabetic symbols so that your password can’t be guessed. Unfortunately, this is not the case.
The man who wrote the now ubiquitous guidance, Bill Burr, has admitted he was wrong. In fact ‘thisismypasswordnow’ is more hack proof than ‘h4cK3r!’
So how do you keep your accounts secure?
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Use a Passphrase
- A single word is easy for a computer to hack. Using a longer phrase made up of separate unique words is much more secure.
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Use two-factor authentication
- This service provided by many software programmes. Two-factor authentication means you will be sent a code by text or through an app to verify your identity when you log in to an account.
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Try a password manager
- iCloud chain and other similar services will create and store secure and unique passwords for you. This is useful as no matter how good a password is, if you reuse it you are more vulnerable to a cyber attack across multiple accounts.
With the new GDPR data regulation that recently came into force and the recent cyber attacks, cyber security is more important now than ever. Are your accounts secure?