Safeguarding Your Password

Tips on safeguarding your password

1. Never give your password to anyone, especially if prompted by an email or phone request.
2. Never write it down.
3. Make it hard to guess, so others won’t be able to easily obtain it by making a good guess.
4. Do not use common dictionary terms, pets’ names, kids’ names, your own name, or the word password.

Helpful hints for safe passwords

Make it something you can easily remember. Use a combination of upper and lower case letters, numbers and symbols.

1. Create an acrostic from the letters of a phrase. For example, “I have too many passwords to remember!” could be a password of “Ih2Mp2r!”. If you have to change the password with some frequency, use the password phrase and the numbers representing the month and year, “Ih2Mp2r!1210”
2. Make up a nonsense word from pronounceable syllables, for example: a. NUKARGO (new-car-go) b. BLUSKYDAY (blue-sky-day) 3. Use special characters #, $, and @ with numbers to form pronounceable passwords: a. I81#ofF@ (I ate one pound of fat.) b. $$Talks2 (Money talks, too.)

These examples should assist you with creating your own unique password that you can easily remember without writing it down.

Source: CUcontent.com