In this day and age there are not a lot of people (hopefully!) that are still writing down their passwords on sticky notes and placing them on the bottom of their computer screen. While that may seem like a ridiculous thing to do with our current knowledge about security and privacy, there are things that are just as harmful to your password and account security.
In this short blog post we will discuss why it is important to pay attention to password security, what you can do to protect your accounts to the best of your capabilities, why even the president of the United States of America is not safe, and end things with a little goodie!
Why should you even care?
Well, stating the obvious. You don’t want your accounts to be breached. However, you might not know what the severity of a hacked account may be. A hacked account can lead to a lot of damage, from losing clients because your business email got hacked, to losing company data to malicious parties, compromising your credibility as an organization.
The vast majority of breaches happen because of human error. Phishing attacks are an example of that and at the same time serve the example that a good password is not the only thing you should keep in mind when thinking about your password and account protection.
What should you keep in mind?
There are a few things you can do to quickly be up to standards and secure all your digital accounts.
Length & Complexity
Although most people know that you should have a strong password, statistics show that not everybody adheres to the guidelines!
The basics of a strong password are:
- At least eight characters in length, but the more the better (think 20)!
- Use a combination of lower and upper case letters, special characters, and numbers.
- Avoid using the obvious, like ”123456”, your date of birth or the name of your favourite soccer team.
- Alternatively, create a long passphrase. That is a sentence or combination of words you will remember well, but is difficult to hack.
Be mindful that hackers can also access social media and use public information. A good example of how to not do it is the hack of Donuld Trump his Twitter account in 2020. It took a Dutch ethical hacker only 5 tries to guess the password “maga2020!”, referring to “Make America Great Again”. Not a notibly difficult password to guess if you research Trump for a few minutes.
Make it unique
In the case that there is a leak of your password, you want to be sure that there will be no other accounts that are at risk of getting hacked. It might not even be your own fault, because your password could also have been part of a hack of another company whose services you use. This is still a big problem as 44% of users report recycling passwords across personal and business-related accounts.
Update it regularly
Make it a habit to periodically check and change your passwords, as this will further decrease the chance of a hack. You might have been in a hurry once and as a result created a password that is not up to your new standards. This way you ensure you are always on top of things.
Multi factor authentication
Adding another layer of security is multi factor authentication (or MFA). This requires you to provide another form of identification on top of your password, like a code from an authenticator app, an email or sms code, or even using biometrics to unlock your account. Having these extra security measures in place ensures that your account is still safe, even after your password has been hacked.
Use a password manager
We are not robots and can’t possibly remember 80 different passwords, all long and unique. This is where password managers come in. These password managers allow you to store passwords and other highly sensitive data in one convenient environment. This way you only need to remember one (of course long and unique) password, while still complying with best practices.
An important thing to note is that these password managers are a very enticing target for hackers, for obvious reasons. That is why it is very important to choose your password management provider wisely.
Gift to get you started!
All features mentioned above are essential. There are lots of password managers, but vBoxx has an extra focus on hosting fully in the Netherlands to ensure privacy and security. With our ISO 27001 certificate you can rest assured that your data is safe. Especially handy for businesses that want to keep password security in their organization highly secure with custom policies and dark web monitoring!