10 Password Best Practices
With the business world heavily reliant on digitalisation today, the use of technology in your organisation is unavoidable. Although technology can undeniably give your business an advantage in increasingly competitive markets, there are many troublesome areas to keep an eye on. This is why interest in cybersecurity has risen in recent years.
Password protection is the best place to start if you want to ramp up your cybersecurity. Password protection involves setting a password to secure an entity’s data. Once data is password-protected, only those with passwords can access information or accounts. However, because passwords are frequently used, people tend to overlook their significance and make careless mistakes, which could lead to security breaches.
This makes it imperative for businesses to devise strategies to educate employees about best practices when using passwords.
5 Password “Don’ts”
Protect the confidentiality of your passwords by following these five passwords “don’ts”:
- Don’t write passwords on sticky notes. Please!
Although you may feel that writing down passwords improves password protection and makes it more difficult for someone to steal your passwords online, it can make it easier for someone to steal them locally.
- Don’t save passwords to your browser.
Web browsers are terrible at protecting passwords and other sensitive information, such as your name and credit card number. They can easily be compromised, and a wide range of malware, browser extensions, and software can extract sensitive data from them.
- Don’t iterate your password (for example, PowerWalker1 to PowerWalker2).
Although this is a common practice among digital users, it is unlikely to protect against sophisticated cyber threats. Hackers have become far too intelligent and can crack iterated passwords in the blink of an eye.
- Don’t capitalise the first letter of your password to meet the “one capitalised letter” requirement.
Most of us capitalise the first letter of our passwords out of habit to comply with the “one capitalised letter” requirement. However, hackers know this, making it easy to guess the capitalised letter’s position.
- Don’t use “!” to conform with the symbol requirement.
However, if you must use it, don’t place it at the end of your password. Placing it anywhere else in the sequence makes your password more secure.
5 Passwords “Do’s”
Protect the confidentiality of your passwords by following these five password “do’s”:
- Create long, phrase-based passwords that exchange letters for numbers and symbols.
For instance, if you choose “Honey, I shrunk the kids,” write it as “h0ney1$hrunkth3k!d$.” This makes your password harder for hackers to crack.
- Use multifactor authentication.
It’s your responsibility to do everything in your power to keep nefarious cybercriminals at bay. One of the best approaches is to barricade them with multiple layers of authentication.
- Always use passwords that are longer than eight characters and include numbers, letters and symbols.
The more complicated things are for hackers, the better.
- Always use a different password for every account.
If you use the same password across multiple accounts, you are handing cybercriminals a golden opportunity to exploit all your accounts.
- Use a password manager.
A password manager can relieve the burden of remembering a long list of passwords, freeing up time for more productive tasks.
Do you need a password manager? Centinell can help.
Adhering to password best practices requires constant vigilance and effort. As a result, it is best to work with an expert managed service provider (MSP) like Centinell, who can help you boost your security and put your mind at ease. Contact us for a no-obligation consultation.
