While Wired‘s cover story about the failure of passwords (“Kill the Password: Why a String of Characters Can’t Protect Us Anymore”) is now a couple of months old, it is still very relevant. It is certainly a worthwhile read for all people in our digital age. It provides a good overview of the compromising positions that passwords can put us in, no matter how diligent we are at creating and keeping “good” passwords.
Bored teens and highly motivated criminals are both part of the threat to your personal information. Additionally, overly helpful customer service personnel can be persuaded to relinquish control of your account to a persistent hacker. Information discovered about you through simple searches can be used against you.
There are steps you can take to make it more difficult for a would-be hacker. But eventually, the password may be just one of several authentication methods of keeping your information secure. Below, I’ve reproduced the article’s tips for what you should and should not do.
