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I Can Guess Your Password.

Baby Boomer Going Like Sixty Posted on by


There was a great scene in a movie or TV show where the nerd hacker was trying to access the secret files of the bad guy.  He said it could take days… and then he started trying different combinations. His name backwards, no. His name and wifes name, no. His name and wifes birthday, no.  Anyway, just by knowing some background on the person he cracked the password easily.

OK, yes it was fiction, but I’ll bet a dedicated hacker might be able to guess your password.

Is it on this list?

  • Your middle name
  • Your Name spelled backwards
  • Phone numbers
  • The word “password”
  • You kid’s birthday
  • Single or combination uses of love, god, sex, and money, such as lovemoney or sexgod
  • qwerty
  • abc123
  • password1
  • asdf
  • car license
  • letmein
  • yourname1
  • default

The indispensable Lorelle at Word Press says that these are the most commonly used passwords! But she also writes at length about how to make your password more secure.

With all of the hype over security vulnerabilities and patches, virus scanning programs, firewalls, and protecting passwords and usernames, people are still really stupid when it comes to choosing and disclosing their usernames and passwords.

The strongest passwords are created with letters and numbers, or even with characters such as !@#$%*(). There are also a variety of free online programs that will help you create a complex and not easily broken password. Unfortunately, remembering such passwords is more challenging.

She goes on to give some excellent tips on creating a secure – but easy to recall password.

A password is like a toothbrush: Choose a good one and don’t share it.

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Comments

I Can Guess Your Password. — 11 Comments

  1. Thanks for the kind words. Now, what password did you come up with? 😉

    I was really astounded when I read about the myspace password debacle. Thousands of people handed over their passwords to a myspace page when asked. Amazing how idiotic some people can be. You think they’d learn. But that comes with age and learning the hard way, heh? 😀

  2. Hi, Thanks for writing. Thanks for the great blogs you do about Word Press.
    My password is *****************
    It’s a wild, wild web.

    Mark

  3. Well, I guess I defy the odds. My password isn’t there. And as far as making younger friends just so they can attend my funeral–have you heard of satirical writing?

  4. My password is not on the list! It’s the number I played several years ago when I won the State Lottery.

  5. Glad you got a good password.
    I’m sorry I offended you about making younger friends. I too was making a joke. Thus the happy face. Dangers of being sarcastic. I apologize.

  8. I’m really glad that you made this post because I was helping my mother with her new computer the other day and she totally had one of these passwords! I need to change it still, but I know that it’s not safe at all. It might stop somoene for a few minutes, but it’s easier just to memorize a new password…

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