IT Security Tip #6: Why is it so important to have unique passwords for all your online accounts?
IT Security Tip #6: Why is it so important to have unique passwords for all your online accounts?
A complex password is a necessity in the current age of cyberthreats, data breaches and other security incidents. But it is hard to keep the seemingly hundreds of passwords, one for each of the accounts you own, straight, secure and different.
Wait, what’s that? All of your passwords aren’t different?
Why is having different passwords so important?
When an online retailer, or a website, gets hacked, oftentimes all you hear in the news is about how many credit cards were lost or what the financial damage was. You rarely hear about the user accounts that were compromised.
However, if you have an account on a compromised website, the username and password you used very possibly could be published and available to hackers on the Dark web who will try everything in their power to use this information against you.
A clever crook knows that you probably use the same password on the compromised website as you do on your eBay, Amazon or other online accounts that may have a bank account tied to it. So you just made it really easy for him/her to spend money in your name, or worse yet, access your bank account.
It is possible to keep the password madness under control. Ask us for tricks to having unique but memorable passwords. You might be surprised by how easy it really is. The bottom line is that no matter how much of a pain it is, it is very important to have different passwords for each online account.
Priority for today: at very least make sure, that your financial accounts each have their own, unique passwords. I’m pretty sure that chasing down and stopping third-party credit card spenders, was not on your list of things to do today.
Helpful? We hope so
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