Strong passwords should:
- Be at least six characters long. If you use a Macintosh on campus, limit your password to eight characters.
- Include uppercase and lowercase letters, numbers, and non-alpha-numeric marks ($, @, ~, #, &, etc).
Avoid the obvious:
- Avoid your birthdate, your username, your Simmons ID number, your telephone number.
- Avoid proper names or words that are in the dictionary. It is no longer sufficient to use a word and substitute zeros for o's or ones for l's.
- Avoid any password that has been used as an example for creating a good password.
More Tips:
It may seem difficult to come up with a secure password that you can actually remember. Here are some memory strategies:
-
Think of a sentence, take the first letter of each word, and use punctuation marks to substitute for one or more of the letters. For example:
"The quick fox jumped over the lazy brown dog" might become:
TqFj^t1bD -
Compose your password by remembering a song that you misunderstood the lyrics to. For example:
You may have misheard Jimmy Hendrix sing "Excuse ME while I kiss this Guy". So make your password:
eM!w1ktg
