Question:

How do I make sure my password is secure?

Dos and Don'ts of Passwords

Here are some do's and don'ts when choosing a password. Information security demands that you choose a password that will be difficult to guess.
Don'ts
1. Don't use your login name in any form (as-is, reversed, capitalized, doubled, etc.).
2. Don't use your first or last name in any form. Don't use use your spouse's or child's name.
3. Don't use other information easily obtained about you. This includes license plate numbers, telephone numbers, social security numbers, the brand of your automobile, the name of the street you live on, etc.
4. Don't use a password of all digits, or all the same letter. This significantly decreases the search time for a cracker.
5. Don't use a word contained in English or foreign language dictionaries, spelling lists, or other lists of words. Don't use a password shorter than six characters.

Do's
1. Do use a password with mixed-case alphabetic characters.
2. Do use a password with nonalphabetic characters, e.g., digits or punctuation.
3. Do use a password that is easy to remember, so you don't have to write it down.
4. Do use a password that you can type quickly, without having to look at the keyboard.

This makes it harder for someone to steal your password by watching over your shoulder.

Password Creativity

To ensure your email security be creative in your password choice. Here are some other ways to create a good password.

Choose a line or two from a song or poem, and use the first letter of each word. For example, "In Xanadu did Kubla Kahn a stately pleasure dome decree" becomes "IXdKKaspdd." Or, alternate between one consonant and one or two vowels, up to eight characters. This provides nonsense words that are usually pronounceable, and thus easily remembered. Examples include "routboo," "quadpop," and so on. Choose two short words and concatenate them together with a punctuation character between them. For example: "dog;rain," "book+mug," "kid?goat."

Think Before you Create your Password

When you are choosing a password to ensure your email security, give the matter some careful thought. The object when choosing a password is to make it as difficult as possible for a cracker to make educated guesses about what you've chosen. This leaves him no alternative but a brute-force search, trying every possible combination of letters, numbers, and punctuation. A search of this sort, even conducted on a machine that could try one million passwords per second (most machines can try less than one hundred per second), would require, on the average, over one hundred years to complete.

Computer Password Security

Your password is key to your online security, and it is only as secure as you make it. In addition to choosing a password that can't be guessed or found in a dictionary, you need to make sure not to tell anyone your password. If you want to let a friend or family member have access to your computer, set up a separate account for them so they can't get access to your personal files.

Password Social Engineering

As strange as it may seem, one of the oldest tricks in the hacker's repertroire is what hackers call “social engineering”. In other words, conning someone into revealing a password or a credit card number. Beware of email or even phone calls from people purporting to be a systems administrator asking you for your password or other sensitive information. If someone contacts you asking for this information, do not give it to them under any circumstances.

Email Password Security

Passwords are the primary defense and front-line computer security for your internet security. A good password is one of the easiest and most effective ways to help secure your system and email security. If someone obtains your password, then they have complete access to your account and all its data, and to all the privileges and abilities you have. If you give your password to anyone, you are giving them significant power while keeping all the responsibility for their wielding it.