How to create a strong password

Strong passwords secure your personal information and keep prying eyes away from seeing what they’re not supposed to be seeing whether those are emails, files, or anything else.

Although Mat Honan’s experience wasn’t directly related to a weak password it offers an absolutely epic (and he even uses that word) example of what can happen when accounts are compromised and accounts can definitely be compromised via weak passwords.

So, what differentiates strong passwords from weak passwords?

Strong passwords are longer

You don’t want to choose a password that’s less than 8 characters. If you want to go one step beyond make it over 15 characters because those are more difficult to crack. Don’t get me wrong. They’re still crackable, but it takes a lot longer.

Strong passwords are unique

All your passwords should be unique. You shouldn’t be using them anywhere else.  Many people do this because they have so many accounts and it makes things easier. However, it’s a very dangerous practice. If you’re doing this and someone cracks one password they have access to every account where the same ID and password is being used.

Your passwords should also be historically unique and by that I mean that they shouldn’t be passwords that you’ve used before. You will often be alerted if you try to do this.

Strong passwords don’t contain guess-able information

Is your dog’s name “Jack London”? Don’t use “jacklondon” in your password even if you’re thinking about replacing those o’s with zeros and the a with the @ character.

You also don’t want to use your nickname, street name or address for the same reason. These are all details about you that are either already known by your circle of family, friends, neighbors, and co-workers or, if they aren’t, they’re fairly easy to uncover.

The idea is to avoid anything that you think someone could guess. People can also guess keyboard patterns like QWERTY or 1234 so you don’t want those in your password either.

Strong passwords use a mix of letters, numbers, and symbols

Don’t choose passwords made up of only letters, symbols, or numbers. Choose passwords that are made up of all three and that include both uppercase and lowercase letters.

Strong passwords aren’t left lying around

This one should be obvious. However, you’d be surprised at how careless people can be. Your password should not be floating around your desk on a piece of paper. Store it somewhere safe. It’s a password.

In addition to the above, you should also,

Consider using a trusted password management tool

The obvious benefit of using a password management tool is that you only need to remember one password. However, you’re going to need to do your research and make sure that it’s a trusted password management tool. LastPass is a popular password management tool at an affordable price.

Consider using multi-factor authentication

Multi-factor authentication adds another layer of security which is always good. If the bad guys manage to crack your password they’ll have a tougher time accessing your account if you’re using multi-factor authentication.

Consider lying for those reset questions

You know those reset questions that ask you for the name of your first grade teacher or your first pet?  You don’t need to tell the truth. You’re free to make up any answer you want. However, you do need to remember how you responded if you want to be able to reset your password later.

Ideas for strong passwords

Take a word or phrase and replace some of the letters with numbers or symbols. For example, “jacklondon” could become “j@ckL0nd0n”. (This isn’t an example of a great password. I’m just giving you an idea about how this works.)

Choose a sentence and then use the first letter of each word. For example, “You can never have just one tom cat” might become “YcnHj0tc”.

As I mentioned earlier, the longer the better. The “just one tom cat” example above only has 8 characters so it’s not ideal. You’re going to want to pick a long phrase that you’ll always remember and do the same thing. This might be a line from a song or a favorite poem.