Get Started with Google
Keeping yourself and your family safe whilst using your Google apps is
just as important as it is when you are sharing your details and your files
online. That said it doesn’t need to be difficult. While using the Internet
and social networks can have its problems, you can reduce them to a
minimal level by following a few simple pieces of advice.
Online Passwords
If you are anything like us, the number of passwords that you need
to remember grows on an almost daily basis and because of this, it
can be tempting to use the same or similar passwords for several
different websites. This is a bad idea, particularly if your chosen
password is something easy to guess such as your name or date of
birth. Here are a few tips to consider when creating passwords.
Keep them Unique
❱ Having a unique password for each website you are required to
log in to is a very good idea, particularly for things like email and
online banking. Although security on a banking website is likely to
be very good, if you use the same password on a website with less
stringent security, you risk it being compromised on one and used
to gain access to the other. It is not unusual for criminals to harvest
passwords from a weak website and then randomly try them on
more secure sites.
Keep them Random
❱ Try to avoid using anything that is easy to guess, including
personal information like your name, date of birth or address.
These things are all very easy to discover and often the first things
someone will try to get into your accounts. Also avoid, if possible,
using real words or sequential strings of numbers, e.g. 123456789.The Longer, the Better
❱ Short passwords are much easier to crack than long ones, so be
sure to avoid anything less than eight characters and, if possible,
go for something ten characters long at least. There are 4000
times more possible combinations of ten letters and numbers,
than there are for eight letters and numbers. Most good websites
require at least eight character passwords nowadays.