Forget the post-it next to the computer or the "historical" password used over and over again and therefore unforgettable.
Between prying eyes and data leaks that gradually affect all the giants of the web, your password may already be well known to malicious minds.
Le Parisien advises you on the right method to protect yourself online thanks to computer hygiene rules.
Simple but not basic
This is the minimum required when creating an account or modifying a forgotten password: it has more than eight characters (letters, numbers and random symbols). You are strongly advised not to reuse the same password or one of its variants on your different accounts. Because once a cybercriminal has discovered the precious sesame, he can run powerful algorithms that will deduce in a few minutes what you thought was the subtlety that changes everything. Very popular with hackers and inexpensive, the
brute force
method
uses software that tests all possible combinations to discover the key.
Adding a date, for example, during an update therefore does not protect more.
Be careful not to think about being smarter by typing all the letters diagonally on the keyboard.
Do not hesitate to change your password every six months at least even if it is sometimes time consuming.
From distancing
Cyber crooks who target a particular person for different motives - greed or personal revenge in mind - will use deep knowledge of your personality or your private life.
This bundle of clues will help them find the password.
Exit therefore the sources of inspiration such as the name of your pet, your year of birth, the birthday of your children ... Same principle for telephone numbers or addresses easy to find by looking in the directories in line.
Instead, think about a strong password made up of four unrelated words.
You can entrust this anonymization task to a password generator which will decide for you in all neutrality.
A clean password involves creating a bubble of protection.
Easy for you, complicated for them
The only way to be safe is a complete sentence that you are the only person to know by heart and which will contain at least a dozen characters including alphanumeric characters like @, # or punctuation!
and?.
We will obviously also add capital letters and a number or two.
Objective: to make the task of deciphering more complex while keeping a magic formula in mind.
A simple password in 7 basic characters breaks in a few seconds while with 10 characters including one to two symbols, this duration increases to several months.
A phase like “!
How is it going ?
"Will take for example 2 weeks to be" broken "by software.
What deter the cybercriminal and push him to move on.
The managers' alternative
They are called Lastpass, NordPass, 1Password, Bitwarden or even the French Dashlane. They have in common to simplify digital life by playing the intermediary. Available on both PC and smartphone apps, most are free with paid options and all run on the same password encryption technology. They store all your sesame words in a protected database so you don't have to remember them all. A general password, which may be the sentence mentioned above, unblocks them when accessing a bank account or a social network.
To appeal to a large audience, these companies offer to encrypt, to render opaque in a way, the database of your passwords directly on the device before sending it to their servers.
The manager editor acts as a trusted third party and does not know the solution himself.
But he cannot send it back to you if you forget it ...
We recommend that you enable two-factor authentication by default, which involves a code sent by SMS or email and provides an additional layer of security.
Comfort and serenity too.
