Posted by Daryl Rinaldi on Mon, Dec 28, 2009 @ 05:12 PM
The previous post told you about a cool little tool called Roboform that allows you to not have to remember a bunch of different passwords. As an IT Support company, we at GizmoFish advise our customers on IT Security best practices. Part of that discussion is often providing advice on creating passwords that are longer, more complex, and therefore more secure. Here are some tips:
1. Think pass-phrase, not pass-word. A long phrase of strung together words can be just as easy to remember but much harder to crack. Ex."TheBostonCelticsbeatLA".
2. Use an absolute minimum of 8 characters (more is better.) Using an easy to remember phrase makes it much easier to add length.
3. Replace letters with numbers or symbols in words. 1 for i or l, 0 for o, @ for a or e, 5 or $ for s are just a few examples. Ex. TheB0st0nCelt1c$be@tLA"
4. Use the first letters of the 1st line of your favorite song. Ex. There's a lady who's sure all that glitters is gold = talwsatgig. Easy to remember (sing to yourself), hard to guess.
5. Never use your name or initials in any passphrase. C'mon, how easy do you want to make it for the bad guys? Ditto your birthdate. Think that info is hard to get?
Posted by Daryl Rinaldi on Sun, Dec 27, 2009 @ 04:37 PM
I know, I know; You have too many passwords to remember so the easiest thing to do is make them all the same and all short and easy to remember - right? -- Wrong! I hope your IT Support firm has told you that while that may save you frustration it also leaves you easy prey to password guessers and crackers. Fortunately there is a better solution -- use Roboform. Roboform is a great little product that adds a toolbar to your internet browser with all of your website user names and passwords. You only have to remember 1 password -- the password to open Roboform (Please please please make THAT a complex password). Every other password is in the Roboform software. In fact even the links to the login pages for your saved websites are in the Roboform toolbar so you don't have to remember the URL or add it to your favorites.
So just click on the Roboform toolbar and select, for example, the GizmoFish Customer Login and your browser will go to the GizmoFish site that allows customers to create tickets and view and edit existing tickets, Roboform will fill in your user name and password and click the login button for you. And Roboform is smart enough to recognize if you change your password to a site and ask you if you want to update the information in Roboform. Roboform saves the information in a strongly encrypted format for security.
I must say that some people in the IT industry think that Roboform is a security problem because access to all your sites is protected by only 1 password. While we recognize that concern, in our experience people have too many sites to create and remember complex passwords for so they end up just using either the same password (or almost the same one) or very short and easy-to-remember (and thus easy to crack) passwords. We think the risk is much higher that people will use simple, easy-to-crack passwords than the risk that someone with nefarious intent will obtain your PC and crack your roboform password. With roboform you can use more complex and random passwords than you ever would if you had to remember them yourself. In fact Roboform will even generate random complex passwords for you!
Roboform is well known and respected in the industry. It was was named PC Magazine Editor's Choice, and CNET Download.com's Software of the Year.Roboform works with Internet Explorer and Mozilla. The best $29.95 you ever spent! Click on the image below to to to the Roboform home page to learn more or to purchase.
PS. And to you cynics out there -- No we do NOT resell or get a commission on Roboform. We just think it is a great product that you should know about.