Passwords - How Secure is Yours?

Is your password 123456 or “password?” How did I know? Those are 2 of the 10 most used passwords! Our life today requires us to have passwords for many things – to log onto our work computer, access our bank accounts, email accounts and home networks and even to log onto “Patch!”

It seems that just as you have one that you can remember, has the correct number of letters and numbers, the requirements for a new account change. Some require upper and lower case letters, numbers and special characters like %$#.

Here’s a tip that might help you in creating a secure, but memorable password, that will be difficult for hackers to discover.

Think of a phrase or song lyric that you can remember, like “I wish I bought Google Stock in 2004” Take the first letter of each word – iwibgsi2. Now substitute upper case and special characters - 1wibG$1@ (the 2 with the shift key becomes the @ symbol). This password would be much more difficult for someone to hack into! For added security, add some letters for the specific site. For gmail it might be 1wibG$1@gm, for Bank of America - Boa1wibG$1@.

There are password generator sites and programs to help you recover your passwords - but you are better off if you can create one that you will remember! Please change your easy passwords today!