I wrote this about two years ago to help people make realistic passwords. The best part was while writing it I realized I encrypted the list in a manner only the maker would know.... on to the show
Pa$$w0rdz
Passwords should easy to remember. Now I'm not saying 123456 is ok, but "G4ftyEF345fs@24%F@" is just ridiculous. So if we have to have a password, let us try and make it fun and easy.
Password requirements will be different at every web page. Let's use Apple as an example of what you have to have for your password. "Your password must be at least eight characters including a number, an uppercase letter, and a lowercase letter. You cannot use spaces, the same character three times in a row, your Apple ID, or a password you've used in the last year."
WOW, I just wanted to make a password, I wasn't expecting them to want a DNA sample. Well don't worry, we can make this easy by making a theme.
So let us pick a theme and make a password the D.o.D. would be proud of. Our dogs name is Inara and she would be proud to be our password for todays overview. 'Inara' will be my base that I can prefix and suffix till the day retina scans become required. 'Inara' is only five characters so we will need to add something to tie it to Apple. 'InaraApple' satisfies everything but the number so let us add the month she came into our life 'Inara12Apple'. Now we have a twelve characters upper and lower case, numeric password. The variations could be '12InaraApple', 'iNaraaPple12', 'applEinarA12', but the icing on the cake would be to add a symbol or two. ' 'Inara@12(Apple)'
Here is a simple outline to help define the parts.
- The base : Inara
- The place: Apple
- The numbers: 12
- The symbols: @ , ( )
Once you have the theme, then it makes it easy to keep track of your passwords. Here how I write my password list.
Instead of writing 'Apple', I write place. So using this theme I can write my password like:
place Base number symbol -- so this is safe to write down on paper and no one will ever guess your password.
Enjoy, be safe, and bring a Nerd
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3 Comments
I would not even use words to be sure only a brute-force attack can find your password.
Btw I recommand Dashlane to save all your passwords.
You will only have to remember one very hard password, and then you can generate the most complex passwords you want for every different account you own.
And use 2factor authentification, to stay safe even if your computer is compromised.
I just noticed it's not open source, so I'm not sure if it's safe anymore... Any opinion on that matter?
The majority of the normal world can't remember 12345678. Try to see who it was written for and the basic concept it provides. Telling a customer not to use a real word is like telling them to speak Hebrew. Realistically this is a step in a direction, lets get them to remember a password then we can work on difficulty levels.
I agree, passwords created like this should already be harder to crack.
but personally I like to think that the NSA has a 500 petaflop supercomputer constantly trying to crack my password to stay on the safer side :)
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