A password is like a key. If you need only one to open all the doors, you can leave them open as well. A master password is probably the worst idea when your online safety is at stake. Especially when it contains a personal piece of information that is easy to find, for example your birth date, favourite colour or your pet’s name. Do you want to be sure that your data are safe and no one will guess your password? Create your own, each for every profile, using one of these methods.
How to create a strong password and remember it?
A strong password need to consist of at least 8 (however more and more specialists recommend min. 10-12 signs) big and small letters, numbers and special characters in a combination difficult to guess. It’s best if a password has all types of these symbols. Every additional one make a password stronger and the number of possible combinations bigger.
Before we show you how to create secure password, you need to know what makes them weak. All the popular quotes, pieces of favourite songs, usernames and patterns (such as
“John1998” or “pass1234” are out of question. These are the ones of the first guesses even of the amateur hackers. The record of a typical word by means of special characters, eg. “p@$$w0rd” instead of “password” is also not recommended.
And now the methods. There is a few of them to create a secure password. We can use a password generator (some pages and applications, eg. WordPress, gives you such an opportunity), and then learn it by heart. You can also apply one of mnemonic techniques, which are effective memorization routines. Look at the list of ways recommended by us.
Method nr 1: Your own code
It’s surely harder to memorize the sequence of seemingly accidental signs “Mci14y0ain0f!” but if you treat it as a shortcut… Look at the sentence “My cat is 14 years old and is not fat!”. Leave only the numbers, the first letters, the letter “o” and the exclamation mark. Then write the number “0” instead of the letter “o”. Now you can get “Mci14y0ain0f!”. Simple, isn’t it?
You can modify this method in any way you want. For example, you can use the first two letters, write small and big letters, change numbers with special characters (4 as $, 5 as % etc.). You only need to remember the rules you set and the original sentence/phrase.
Method nr 2: Passphrase
A passphrase is a sequence of coincidental words. It’s important that the words in a passphrase are really coincidental (our mind can give us some words logically connected that can be guessed by others). So how to create a secure passphrase? Open an dictionary on any page and write down the first word you notice. Repeat it 4-5 times and it’s done! You can also add a number or a special sign. Remember to remove accents and other signs typical of your language because they can cause some errors while logging in. The illustrative passphrase may look like this: “2017 organisation scream surname content bird &”.
Method nr 3: Use the keyboard layout
Another way to create a strong password is the usage of the keyboard layout. If you look at the arrangement of the keys, you can see that the password “4rFvBgT56yHn” is the sequence of signs from 4 to “v”, then from “B” to 5 and from 6 to “n”. It’s a typical chain of signs with numbers, special characters, big and small letters. Naturally you can also replace numbers with special characters and then you get “$rFvBgT%^yHn”. It’s easy to create and remember.
Why is important to have various passwords?
A professional needs only a few minutes to break a typical password to a mailbox or an admin panel. And another few to get the rest of accounts and crucial data if you use the same password everywhere. Only a strong and unique sequence of characters can help you avoid such attacks.
Regardless of the method you choose (and modify), the key to success will be the rules known exclusively to you. Such a password is not only easy to remember but also to change by applying the same procedure. You’ll see that your passwords will look for others as a complicated sequence of random signs but for your mind it will be a logical jigsaw.
Remember also that do not write down your passwords on a post-it notes nearby your computer, in a notebook or in a text file on the computer. If you need to store all your passwords somewhere, choose a safe program, for example KeePass.