Insight: Top Tip: Protect your passwords

If you were paid to find and crack email passwords, could you do it? 

Well, with passwords written down like this, of course you could.

If you knew that the person who had these passwords listed here had, for example, children called David and Emma, born in the 80’s, do you think you could work out their password in just a few attempts? The answer is absolutely.  Scary thought.

Criminals use social media to track, follow and understand peoples lives in order to use this knowledge to “crack” passwords. And like so many people, if they’ve managed to decipher one password, they’ll likely be able to get into many more of your accounts. 

The main ways to stop this happening is to ALWAYS use a Password Manager. 

Password Managers generate unique passwords, store your login info for all the websites you use and then log into them automatically for you.  They encrypt your password database with a master password so that the master password is the only one you have to remember.  Simple and above all, safe.

If you are worried that you and your team are still living in the dinosaur ages and pencilling password on post-it notes (a thought as scary as a T-Rex!), make sure you speak to an IT and cyber security specialist who can help you implement a safe and secure management system to make sure your emails, systems and databases are secure.