Secure passwords

[Oskar45]

How secure are yours? I use something everyone who mastered grammar school certainly knows about. Still, hackers would have a rather hard time to crack it, for sure...

[josehill]

After the recent Gawker.com password fiasco, I've been refreshing many of my accounts with a range of new passwords.

I didn't think that I'd be affected by the Gawker problems, since I don't remember ever signing into or caring about the site, but it turns out that they own a bunch of other sites and use the same authentication system for all of them. I made a comment on one of them, Lifehacker.com, years ago, and I used that username/password pair on a bunch of non-essential sites, so my credentials were compromised.

[ratfink]

My trick is to start with a phrase I'll easily remember, like:

Oh no you don't!

Then start mangling by replacing letters with numbers or symbols that look similar as well. The trick is to use the conversion inconsistantly;

0h_nO-Y0u_d0N'T!

The other trick is to try several variations until you find a combination that rolls off your fingers well.

Geof

[foetz]

for online accounts i only use generated stuff as well as for local services that can be reached from the outside

[miod]

Well, just write down your password in this thread, and we'll tell you if they are strong enough, for free! Aren't we kind hearts?

[josehill]

for online accounts i only use generated stuff as well as for local services that can be reached from the outside

Hey, foetz, great to see you here again!

Do you use a password manager to "remember" the generated passwords? If so, is there a particular one that you recommend?

[Oskar45]

Well, just write down your password in this thread, and we'll tell you if they are strong enough, for free! Aren't we kind hearts?

pi=4,25?

[ratfink]

The main reason I don't use generated password is they are too hard to remember. If they are phrase based, I can make them relatively easy to remember. I used to play the middle row of the keyboard (asdfghjkl) into the white keys of a piano (cdefgabcd) with the upper row (we-tyu-op) into black keys (c#d#-f#g#a#-c#d#) and the make my passwords into musical motifs. For instance, in C-major, the password 'adgfdsasaaasssdddfasdfdfghghjk' is the main theme of Beethovens 5th symphony, 4th movement. The musical approach was basically to build long passwords that where easily remembered. Unfortunately, many system now require mixed upper/lower/number/symbols which makes the musical approach harder. If I can't remember a password, and have to lookitup, it's not very useful to me.

Geof

[Pontus]

I think this comic sums up my thoughts on the matter.

[miod]

Well, just write down your password in this thread, and we'll tell you if they are strong enough, for free! Aren't we kind hearts?

pi=4,25?

Definitely too weak.

Try using ``pi=14.3'' instead.

[guardian452]

A root password on a well-used machine here at school was "ribbed for her pleasure"

I use random goobledygook numbers+letters...

[foetz]

for online accounts i only use generated stuff as well as for local services that can be reached from the outside

Hey, foetz, great to see you here again!

Do you use a password manager to "remember" the generated passwords? If so, is there a particular one that you recommend?

much thanks

of course those kinds of passes have to be written somwhere and my intranet db is just the right place for that. it's platform independent and i can access it in all kinds of ways.
currently running with mysql and as simple as possible. looks like that:

Code: Select all

CREATE TABLE `accounts` (
  `COMPANY` varchar(100) default NULL,
  `LOGIN` varchar(50) default NULL,
  `PASS` varchar(50) default NULL,
  `id` int(11) NOT NULL auto_increment,
  PRIMARY KEY  (`id`)
) ENGINE=MyISAM AUTO_INCREMENT=1 DEFAULT CHARSET=latin1;


just an example but something like that does the job for me

[IndyFred]

I tend to use passwords that are 22 characters long. I know it is a pain, but it gets the job done.

[josehill]

Keep in mind that many systems, including IRIX 6.5, only recognize the first eight characters of a password.

[skywriter]

9 character, mixed case alpha, numerical, with special characters. One for each account kept in my head via muscle memory.