A strong password can be defined as choosing a password that contains numeric characters and special characters or symbols, as well as uppercase and lowercase alphabetic characters.

The minimum characters recommended is usually eight characters. An example of strong password is “Shg5Ra$2ng@1!”

By using a strong password you lower the possibility of a security breach. However the use of strong passwords does not alone make for effective security controls.

When creating a strong password, it is recommended that you avoid words straight from the dictionary. You should also avoid usernames, letter or number sequences e.g. 654321, names of spouses, children, relatives or pets, names of ancestors or dates or birth.

Ensure that the password is unique and its not repeated. Avoid using the same password for multiple websites for example, the password for your email account such as Gmail should be different from the password for your Facebook account. Some online sources recommend that you can use a sentence as a password, this will greatly reduce the possibility of hackers to crack your password For example “whereareyougoing@8pm?”

It’s a good practice to change your password on a regular basis, usually every 30 days and ensure that you DO NOT write your passwords down. Strong passwords will be very difficult to be guessed by human beings and hard to be cracked by computer programs, therefore effectively protecting data and keep it away from unauthorized access.

There are several programs available for download from the internet that are used to crack passwords via various technologies such as brute force attach among others. These password crackers find it hard to crack a strong password as compared to simple passwords.

Be diligent, a strong password is at the heart of online security.

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