Password Mistakes

Published On August 11, 2014 | By Tom Huskerson | Security

As I wrote last week, Russian hackers may have stolen billions of passwords and I am pretty sure your’s and mine are included in the bunch. So I advised all of my readers to change their passwords immediately. I certainly hope you have. Right now, and I’m pretty sure of this, those hackers are disposing of the evidence of their crime. But I am equally sure that they are selling those passwords on the black market as we speak. I just hope that you followed my advice and changed yours making the old password useless. If you haven’t then you were warned.

One of the things I constantly preach is the use of pass phrases rather than passwords. That means long passwords that are jumbled with numbers and characters to make it difficult to guess or break. Here is one of my old passwords that I no longer use; Too2@Ix35!&sFGG. Now you may not see the pattern I used but I gaurantee that I could easily remember that password because it has meaning to me.  And that is way your passwords should look.

Like most people, black people make the same common password mistakes and the result is that someone who is watching you may decide to break your password. It’s pretty if you put your mind to it. Many people use their initials, child’s or pet’s name and easy to guess numbers like an address or zip code. Hackers depend on people using short easy to guess passwords to get into your accounts and rob you. So you need to learn to construct a solid pass phrase.

For more on the common mistakes people make when constructing passwords please visit WeLiveSecurity.com for their short video. It could save you some headaches down the road.

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About The Author

Tom Huskerson Bio Born in Richmond Virginia Tom Huskerson is a military veteran who settled in California after his discharge. Tom attended Santa Barbara City College where he began his writing career as a campus reporter. He worked as an intern news reporter for the Santa Barbara News-Press writing feature stories before moving on to San Francisco. At San Francisco State University Tom studied broadcast communications and began to focus on the Internet. He completed his graduate thesis on Internet advertising. Tom was the first student to ever focus on the Internet as a graduate student at San Francisco State University. After graduation he went to work for Zona Research in California’s Silicone Valley. As a research associate Tom supported senior analyst writing on the latest developments in the Internet industry. During the dot com boom Tom worked for several web businesses as a market researcher and analyst. As a writer and researcher Tom has authored various technical works including a training program for Charles Schwab security. Other projects included professional presentations on workplace violence and hiring security contractors. Tom has also written both fiction and non-fiction works and blogging for a travel website. He has published two books of short stories and completed two novels. Tom is the owner of Scribe of Life Literature and EbonyCandle.com. Tom is not the chief editor for the OnTechStreet. com. A news and information blog that focuses on tech news for African-Americans. The blog is the result of his desire to inform the African American community of the dangers and benefits of the cyber age. In his blog Tom reports on information security, new and analysis, scams and hoaxes, legal happenings and various topics that arise from the age of information. Tom believes that technology is a necessary tool for black people and they should know what is happening. Tom writes believing that techno speak is for the professional and that valuable information can be communicated using plain language. As a result he has embraced the motto, Less Tech, More Knowledge.

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