Creating a Good Password

Internet has given us the capability to trade online or view Banking transactions online and much more. This requires that the you have a good and strong password that would stand up to any brute force attacks. The following article outlines the features of a good password and words or phrases one needs to avoid.

The following words/combinations are not a good choice and have to be avoided in selecting a password:

• Family name or combination of first and last name
• Name of your Pet as in this age of social networking, it is not a safe bet
• Dictionary words or sample words from the Internet

What makes a good password?

While selecting a password, ensure that

• the password has a combination of letters and numbers
• has a mix of lowercase and uppercase characters
• has a minimum of 8 to 15 characters – longer the password the stronger it is

Using the above rules, select a phrase that will be your password. Now the question arises ‘How to select a good phrase’? It is not difficult to select a good phrase that will form the basis of your password by following the steps listed below:

• It should be random
• Easy to relate and part of your everday life

For example, let us say you had a wish(phrase) such as ‘Wish I had a million dollars too’ – Now using mnemonic technique, we can construct a password. Take the first letter in the above sentence Wish I had a million dollars too – wihamdt – Now insert numbers to make it strong and change case – wIh1m$d2 – You have a good password that is unique and something that you can relate easily

Using Diceware Method

Diceware is a method of choosing a phrase by the roll of a dice. The dice is rolled 5 times to get 5 sets of numbers. Each set of numbers is then converted to a ‘word’ by looking at a special diceware list. This method is totally random as it depends on the roll of a dice. Diceware, developed by Arnold G. Reinhold and is available at http://www.diceware.com

Also refer to http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/privacy/password_checker.mspx to check the strength of a password.

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