Identity Theft is becoming a real problem in today’s world of computers and the internet. By going online you can communicate with many friends, and pay bills and check bank accounts etc. All very convenient. It is easy to forget that whilst you are doing these things there are other people and other computers trying to communicate with you without your knowledge!
We protect ourselves by having lots of logins, User Identifiers, passwords, PIN numbers, secret questions etc.
If a password is going to be secure then it needs to be at least 8 characters long, 24 characters is much better! But most people cannot remember all the codes for all the different websites that they visit! You really must not use the same password for all the different websites that you log in to!
One answer is to write all these codes down on a piece of paper or in a book. That is sort of OK, until someone steals the book or you simply lose it! Worse still they might copy the codes without your knowledge.
Fortunately there is a type of computer program that does provide an effective way of managing and using all these passwords and codes etc.
The one I want to refer to is completely free to download and to use and is possibly the best program of it’s type. The name of this product is Keepass. It is like a bank vault where you put all your papers and treasures on the shelves in the vault and then you go out and shut and double-lock the door! No one can get in.
You only ever have to remember one password ever again! Best of all this password can be a phrase or a memorable sentence. I use a quotation from a well-known classical book as my phrase. It would be impossible for someone to guess which quotation I use!
So when I need a user id or a password, I simply log in to Keepass, go to the appropriate section (I have over 50 unique login/password combinations and lots of related information), use the mouse to double-click the password that I want and paste it into the login form, or wherever it needs to go. I don’t even need to know what the password is and I can copy and paste it without having to type it. All my passwords are at least 24 characters long and many are 36 characters long.
You can take as many backups of the Keepass vault as you want. It is important that you do! You can copy it onto CD backups, memory sticks, store it on a website, email it to your friends, etc. Without the memorable login phrase they will not be able to see the data held in the vault.
A word of caution though. There is no point in having a really secure and easy to use program to keep your passwords safe from people who intend to do you harm if you do not ensure that you have sufficient backup copies of the vault itself.
The only way that you can lose all of your password data is if you do not have up to date copies of your password vault in safe places. Ask your self the following two questions:
- If the computer breaks or is stolen do I still have up to date copies of the password vault?
- If the house burns down and all the contents are destroyed, do I still have up to date copies of the password vault?
Some ideas for backing up your password vault. The more copies you have the better.
- Use memory sticks, cd’s, external storage devices
- If you have webmail or gmail then simply email copies to yourself! (doesn’t work with Email clients such as Outlook or Thunderbird)
- If you have a website then copy it online.
- email the vault to some of your friends
- Use an online data backup service
I also use the program to store important information such as passport numbers, social security codes - in fact anything that would cause me a major problem if I lost the information.
Checkout the Keepass product at securely manage your personal data. Remember that it is totally free, the above is not a sales pitch!
There are other similar products but Keepass is the one that I use. Get in touch if you want me to list the product that you use but it must be free.
Tags: identity theft, internet security, password, passwords
May 12, 2008 at 7:19 pm
[...] unknown wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptIdentity Theft is becoming a real problem in today’s world of computers and the internet. By going online you can communicate with many friends, and pay bills and check bank accounts etc. All very convenient. … [...]
May 13, 2008 at 1:14 pm
There is a new breed of password managers - online password managers!
I work for Passpack which also generates strong passwords, organizes and stores your passwords in an online encrypted ‘vault’ and you can access it from any operating system, anywhere you are with internet.
Here is a quick blogpost comparing online vs offline password managers:
http://passpack.wordpress.com/2007/01/29/online-vs-offline-password-managers/
Hope it helps!
Louise
May 13, 2008 at 9:41 pm
The Solution to Passwords
“According to the FBI, 15 million users got their identity stolen last year alone”, (-computerworld.com May 2008). Password-hacking software is free, easily obtained, and highly advanced. As this technology advances, so does the need for longer-stronger passwords.
We are at the mercy of single-factor password protection. Passwords are cumbersome in many ways. They can be hacked, lost, stolen, shared, misplaced, and forgotten.
The only real solution is two-factor authentication. This is the use of passwords and one more additional factor. For this second factor I recommend Biometrics. Biometrics has come a very long way. Certain Biometrics use capacitance scanners to read and authenticate the user’s finger. Along with a password consisting of up to 30 characters, the Biometric reader will authenticate only the authorized user based on a combination of their unique finger print pattern (minutia points), temperature, moisture, and electrical connectivity encrypted via AES 256-bit, same encryption standard used by the US Government.
Lucas L. Lomax
Ceelox, Inc