TruCommunity Blog

October is Cybersecurity Awareness Month! Keeping yourself educated on how to protect yourself online against the various threats will reduce the risk that you lose money or your identity. In fact, the University of Maryland found the average number of cyberattacks per day is 2,244 or 1 every 36 seconds! One of the first ways to protect yourself is through the use of passwords.

Strengthen Your Password: It seems our brains can only hold so much information at one time and it seems to vary day-to-day. It is so strange sometimes how you may remember what you had for breakfast three weeks ago but forgot what a co-worker said three hours ago. Trying to remember a login password just adds to the mess! However, technology has evolved in which passwords can be easily solved by criminals so how can we strengthen our password and remember them? Here are 8 tips that will improve your password security:

Tip #1: Don’t create passwords using information easily found online

Information such as pet’s or children’s names, birthdates, or addresses may be found by searching a person’s name or business website which criminals may try to use to guess your password.

Tip #2: Don’t reuse passwords

According to KnowBe4, a security awareness and training solutions company, the average person reuses each password 14 times!

Tip #3: Try to make your password length at least 12 to 20 characters

Using a password with 8-characters or less may be hacked within one day but simply using a 10-character password [using numbers, upper and lowercase letters, and symbols] may take up to 5 years to break.

Tip #4: Keep the password unique and avoid patterns

Change the entire password -don’t change from password1 to password2.

Tip #5: Use a passphrase

A passphrase is a sentence-like strong of words that are easy to remember but difficult to crack. This makes it easier to get up to 20 characters!

Tip #6: Never share your passwords

Once you share a password, it can be out of your control where it goes or who may gain access to it and your information.

Tip #7: Don’t write passwords down and leave them easily accessible

Similar to above, if someone sees your password it is difficult to control that person from using your password.

Tip #8: Use a password manager

Various computer programs (LastPass or 1Password) exist to store, generate and mange passwords for applications and online services. Be mindful that some are free while others may charge a yearly fee, and both may provide adequate password management services.

It can seem like an inconvenience to remember a different password to every login and site we use but it is a simple way to protect yourself just like locking your car doors. The above tips may help ease the burden, including using password managers that can do the remembering for you! For the month of October, we will be sharing additional information of how you can protect yourself online.