Secure passwords: what they must have and what rule to follow to remember them

In a hyperconnected world, passwords are becoming more and more important. Throughout the day they are used to access devices, streaming platforms or personal profiles.

Whether it’s logging into a computer, mobile, social networks or even bank accounts, you need a password to access almost any website. But how do you create a file pretty sure?

In many occasions personal information is protected only through a password. For this reason, when choosing it, several requirements must be met.

In principle, it is necessary to use a combination of letters, symbols and numbers that provides sufficient security because, after all, it will serve to protect all types of private data.

Long and complex passwords

The US National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has released a report on digital identity guidelines.

This analysis ensures that one of the requirements for password security is its length. It recommends a password between 8 and 64 characters long and encourages the use of long phrases as passwords.

Others, such as Harvard University, ensure that a strong password must contain ten or more characters that combine uppercase letters, at least one lowercase letter, one number (0-9), and one symbol (such as ! , # or %).

A good rule of thumb is to use a long sentence that we can remember, like the name of a little-known song, and Add capital letters and special characters.

Don’t use dates for passwords

It seems obvious but using your date of birth, the day your father was born or the day you got married are passwords that are easily cracked through social engineering.

Putting dates is almost giving away access.

series of words

Another of the most repeated tips from professionals is the use of words that apparently have no connection.

That is, creating a long password using a combination of letters that, at first glance, appear to have no connection to each other but which may have some kind of personal meaning to the user.

This way, they assure, it can be easily remembered.

There are currently reliable web pages to check if your password has been exposed in a cyber attack.

In the I was punished For example, it is possible to know -in detail- if the password has been violated at any time and on which pages the incident occurred.

At the Latin American level, the “Me Filtraron” site allows us to know if our information circulates online, with the particularity that it has records that are not in Have I Been Pwnd.

minimum requirements

Several experts therefore agree on a number of minimum requirements. Here, Pablo Gagliardo, General Manager of Noventiq Argentina, presents 5 tips for creating a secure password.

• It is important to create passwords that have at least 15 or more characters and must combine letters, numbers and symbols.

• Passwords shouldn’t include simple words and personal data, i.e. date of birth, name, surname and none of the members of the family.

• By using different passwords, it is essential not to launder them as if one account is compromised, everyone will be at risk. Each application must have different passwords, and if it is difficult to remember, it must be used a password manager.

• Constantly changing your passwords is an important aspect, but keep it lengthy and remember no repeats.

• Not sharing with anyone is perhaps the most important point, passwords should not be shared by any means of communication e less if you doubt the interest in obtaining it.

Where to save a password

The best thing to do, according to experts, is to memorize the password and not share it with anyone.

If it’s too complicated, another option is to write it down on paper or use a password manager, some of them free like LastPass, Norton or Bitwarden.

An alternative are password managers, which allow secure keys to be stored using a master key. In this case it is essential to have a second authentication factor active and, if you want to be extremely cautious, have a physical key (such as FIDO).

“It is convenient to use managers, currently there are a variety of applications, both free and paid, which make it easier to store different passwords, making sure that they stay where they should be. Google smart lock, Keepass and Keeper They are some of the good options that are on the market today,” says the expert.

It is worth clarifying, yes, that they also pose a risk: LastPass, one of the best known, was hacked twice last year, exposing sensitive user information.

The most used passwords

“A NordPass study revealed the world’s most common passwords in 2022. “Password”, “123456”, “123456789”, “guest” and “qwerty”“They are among the 5 most used, this reveals the lack of cybersecurity culture that many still have”, recalls Gagliardo.

This is extremely dangerous, as simple keys take very little time to be “cracked”.

So, it’s true that it can be more inconvenient to have these security measures in place (what’s known as “friction” in the user experience), but, undoubtedly, prevention is always better than cure, even in the digital world.