How to Create a Secure Password

Creating a secure password for a business can be a little tricky these days. With Fortune 500 companies like Sony and healthcare giants like Anthem Blue Cross being hacked on a regular basis, how can you ensure that your information is locked down tight?

The first key to creating a great password is the length.

The longer the better. The easiest password to break is actually one that is only 4 digits. Use a phrase or a long word to create the base of your password.

Second, incorporate numbers, capitals, and special characters.

These will break up the password and make it a little harder to hack into. Since you’re going outside of the alphabet this increases the time it takes to break the password and increases the difficulty in regards to cracking it.

A great pointer for this is to substitute numbers for letters. Like a number 3 for the letter e or the @ sign for the letter a. These little tricks help you to remember the password since it’ll be a word or phrase, but will make it more secure. By using all of these types of characters and numbers to create your password, you’ll expand your possibility pool –making it harder to crack.

Another way to have a secure password is to use a password generator.

There are a few services that offer them, including Google, which will generate a secure password. The downside to this is that the passwords are often hard to type and are even harder to memorize. Also you’ll need to have to find a way to save them in order to not mistype them, which could put you at risk.

Passwords you should never use:

Things that appear on the keyboard. Yes, a row of keys although easy to remember are very common passwords and are even easier to break. If your password is something like “qwerty” or “1qaz” you should probably change it. Also, stay away from using PASSWORD.

If you stick with something complex and long that incorporates numbers and special characters, you’ll be in good shape to ensure your password is secure.