As a reminder, passwords for sites that have credit card or personal information should have strong, unique passwords:
- Always use at least 8 characters.
- Use a mix of alphabetical and numeric characters. Use a mixture of upper- and lowercase; passwords are case sensitive. Use symbols if the system allows.
- Make your passwords a prefix and a suffix – the prefix might be Rr#1 and you use that for all sites that allow complex passwords
- Some sites may not allow special characters so your prefix for those might be Rr31
- Make your suffix specific to the site – Examples would be:
- 1) using a phrase to match the site: eBay might be “buyme” – Amazon might be “jungle”
- 2) the first letters of the site repeated: ebebeb or amamam
- 3) the site name reversed for four letters: yabe or noza
- Your final password would be something like Rr#1buyme, Rr#1ebebeb, Rr#1yabe
- Avoid suffixes like “ebay” for eBay and “amazon” for Amazon.
- You may want to keep a separate prefix for banking sites.
- You may want a prefix for work versus personal accounts.
If you use the same few prefixes and keep a list of your suffixes, your online accounts will be more secure. If one password is hacked, the hackers only get into that account and maybe know your prefix. #CyberAware
To help keep things straight, you might consider using a reputable password manager. Here are some recommendations:
PCMag’s The Best Free Password Managers for 2015
PCMag’s The Best Password Managers for 2015
