Passwords and keeping it safe

Spoiler Alert

Password managers help improve security by eliminating reusing passwords across multiple sites.

Passwords

The first time I remember setting and owning a password was to log in to my IBM i386 PC. However, the most notable username and passwords for me were ushered in during the MSN and Yahoo Messenger, Hotmail and Yahoo Mail days. Since then, passwords have become a necessary part of our lives. We as humans interact with many sites, a few more frequent than others. It is much easier to remember passwords for the most frequently accessed sites, and we tend to forget passwords for the rest. The most common mistake to make is reusing the same username and password across multiple sites, I will explain why in a moment why so. Another mistake is writing down passwords on stickies, notebooks or in plain text on our mobile phones, I mean, passwords are there to help increase security and not a layer of inconvenience.

Reusing Passwords

Have you ever heard of the term blast radius? Imagine your digital assets (digital identity) as a land mass, and each building on the land represents a website or application. You use the same username and password for each website and application, and a bad actor (hacker) manages to get a hold of your password. You have just gifted them to all your digital assets unimpeded, in essence, an extensive blast radius.
Now imagine if each digital asset was its unique username and password. They are limited to just that one site or application a minimal blast radius, just one building.
You might be saying; this can not happen to me; I am cautious with my credentials. This doesn’t change the fact that the site you trust to keep your credentials safe might be the site that suffers a security breach—simply falling victim to a well-constructed phishing attack and unknowingly giving away your username and password.

Writing down passwords

Another common mistake is writing down passwords in plain text on a notebook, stickies, mobile phones, or digital devices. It is hard to keep on top of all the passwords and give in to storing them in a single place where retrieval is easy however, if misplaced could fall into the wrong hands.
There is a similar way (in concept) of securely storing all passwords in one place. This is what we call Password managers.

Password Managers

Password managers help in securely storing passwords to all your digital assets. They help in generating random passwords with password strengths that meet standards.

So you might be asking, why use password managers? Well for the purpose of..

• Taking the guesswork in trying to dream up a strong password that the site demands you enter.
• Good password managers alert you when they detect the reuse of passwords across multiple sites.
• A good password manager alerts you if you are about to enter your credentials on a phishing site.
• Make accessing your passwords easy from any device, meaning they are backed up into the cloud.
• Most importantly, remove the need to have a memorable password.

Types of Password Managers

There are two types of password managers. Those that are free come with the big tech companies, Google, Apple and Microsoft. Those that are paid LastPass, and 1Password, to name a few.
My advice if you are not using any today is to consider one, any of the above mentioned is better than none.