other devices equipped with wireless transceivers. Figure 14-1 shows four
pieces of equipment: the access point, a hubthat interconnects various wired
devices in your system, a router that examines incoming data from one net-
work and correctly reroutes it to another network, and a broadband Internet
connection — usually a cable or DSL modem.You can also purchase a combined hub and router, or an all-in-one unit that
has a hub, router, and access point. One version of a magic black box also
brings together the cable or DSL modem.Chapter 14: Feeling Up In the Air 219
A scheme for passwords
Unless you have a photographic memory, you
may have to find some way to write down your
passwords. That’s only natural, but don’t make it
easy for someone to steal them. Don’t write
them down and tape them to the side of your
computer monitor. Don’t keep them in your
wallet. And don’t use passwords that are so
very obvious as your date of birth or your wife’s
maiden name; trust me, hackers are smart
enough to try those first.
Here are a few tips to safer computing:
Establish a base of four or five unusual
words that are easy for you to remember but
hard for an outsider to guess. Let’s say, just
as a random example, that you’re a serious
baseball fan — serious enough to remem-
ber the starting lineup for the Los Angeles
Dodgers on September 9, 1965 — the day
Sandy Koufax pitched a perfect game, best-
ing Chicago Cubs pitcher Bob Hendley who
gave up only one hit and one run. Your
secret set of words might include Koufax,
Torborg, Parker, and Lefebvre — the pitcher,
catcher, first baseman, and second base-
man. Baseball scorekeepers assign those
particular four positions as 1, 2, 3, and 4.So if you choose 9koufaxlefebvre65 as a
password,you could write in your notepad
that the password for your bank account is
##14##. You will remember that ## refers to
19 and the second ## is 65 because that is
your base. And you’ll know to substitute
baseball position 1 and 4 as the meat of the
password. And you can reverse spelling,
choosing a password like 19grobrot65rekrap
and noting it in your pad as ##%2##%3. Use
the % sign — or anything else that works for
your — to signify that a word’s spelling is
reversed.Use a password-protection program such
as Norton Password Manager. Under that
program you create one very complex pass-
word and enter it each time you turn on your
machine or reboot it, and then let the soft-
ware automatically fill in passwords for
most web sites you visit.
In any case, change your passwords at
least every six months — and immediately if
you suspect that someone has gained
access to any of your accounts without
your permission.