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Editorial
No, 'password' is not a strong enough password
Wednesday, August 6, 2014
Who are you?
If you've been on the Internet lately, you may now be a Russian hacker, and it's time to change your password to get your identity back.
By some estimates, 2 billion people a day log on to the World Wide Web, and, according to a New York Times story quoting a Milwaukee online security firm, Russian hackers have captured some 1.2 billion username and password combinations.
The Russians did that by adding malicious codes to some 420,000 web sites, the names of which the Milwaukee company, Hold Security, didn't want to release because the sites might still be vulnerable.
With more and more business conducted over the Internet, a security breech of that magnitude is a big deal -- although experts say many of the creditials are probably out of date and no longer used.
Associated Press technology writer Anick Jesdanun offered some tips for keeping your online accounts safe:
* Eight characters are a minimum, but 14 is better and 25 better yet, if your service will allow it.
* Use cominations of upper and lower case letters, numbers and symbols, again if your services will allow "PaSsWoRd!43" is far better than "password43."
* Break up words with numbers to fool software that runs through dictionary words, or, through a memory trick, use the first letters of the words in a sentence, such as "tqbfjotld" for "the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog."
* Substitute characters such as zero for the letter ), or a dollar sign instead of S.
* Avoid using your own name, relatives names, pets, birthdays or zip codes, consecutive numbers or keyboard letters. Try reversing number or letters instead.
We'd add our own tip: Don't use any of the specific examples listed above.
And, of course, it's only a matter of time before creative, devious criminals are able to defeat the techniques listed as well, and an entirely new system of security will have to be invented.
For more tips from the Federal Trade Commission on keeping your online accounts safe, visit http://1.usa.gov/1l1lo4M