Which Word?...Password.

Hi!!

So, in the previous article, you read the importance of cyber security. Now let’s see how to apply the security and secure your online and other digital accounts.

When you create any online account like Gmail, Facebook, Snapchat or even an online net banking account of your bank, you are asked to set a pin or password. Now I know that you can't proceed without doing so, but many people take these passwords lightly and often set a weak password like the word “password” itself. Even though the website accepts that password, in some cases you are required to meet the password policy requirements. These password policies such as password must be 8 characters or more and it must contain special character like $,#,@ etc. So these password policies are there to make sure that you don't set weak and simple passwords. Many websites show strength meters while creating passwords. Please pay attention to the strength of your password.

Now let’s see how to set a strong yet easy to remember password which will fulfill all the password policy requirements.

Let's take an example, say there's a hypothetical website called abc.com. This website has a password policy in which you must create a password which is 10 characters or more and it must contain at least one uppercase alphabet, at least one special character and at least one number.

Now here is a suggestion for creating a strong and easy to remember password. Set a long sentence as your password and include some numbers and special characters. Let's create one password so you will get an idea. Let's take one long sentence like “i am riding an elephant”. This sentence has 19 alphabets, which fulfills our first requirement of minimum characters. Now let's replace one alphabet with an uppercase, say “i". Now the sentence will be like “I am riding an elephant”. Now lets change one letter with a special character. Umm…...ok, we will change all “a”s with “@”, now the sentence will be like “I @m riding @n eleph@nt”. Now the requirement of special character is fulfilled. Let’s do something about that remaining requirement of number, let's add any number, “I @m riding @n eleph@nt12”. Now remove the spaces from the sentence and your strong and easy to remember password is ready: “I@mriding@neleph@nt12”.

It looks complicated, right? It's hard to crack as well.

The password like this takes much more processing power and more time (hours or even days) to crack using brute force attack method.
Many hackers also use dictionary attacks to crack passwords and in some cases use social engineering too. These dictionary attacks are faster than brute force attacks.
But don't be afraid, I will give you some tips to make your password even stronger than we just created earlier in the above example.

OK, so here are some tips:

• Try avoiding your name, surname, birth year and any other information which has any relation with you. Any hacker could get these names and birth years by the use of social engineering, which makes dictionary attacks even more faster and hence makes your password weak.

• Try avoiding obvious words like your pet name or your house name etc. Also avoid use of words which we use often. Instead use rare words in your sentence.

• Use words from your native language or any other language other than modern english. Here is an example for you: “mala mazya deshacha abhiman ahe”. This is a sentence in marathi language typed using english alphabets, which in literal translation means “I am proud of my country”. This technique makes dictionary attacks slow as many attack dictionaries contain standard english words.

Umm… I think this is enough for this article. I want to talk more about passwords but the article is getting too long and we all know that we like to read informative but short articles. Maybe I will write another article on passwords in future. Also don't worry, I will explain all the technical words in future articles.

If you like the article, do comment. Comments encourage me to write more articles and also share this blog with your friends.

Guys don't use the same sentence from the article as your password, create your own unique sentence.

Disclaimer:

Above information is only for informative purposes.

We are not responsible for any loss caused due to application or use of above information in any form.

The information given above may vary, and it may be incomplete.
This Blog is purely meant for EDUCATION purposes ONLY.

© Copyright 2020 The Cybersec Bot.