Passwords are the bane of modern existence. Most of us have dozens or hundreds of accounts with passwords to keep track of. Many people are probably also using the same easy passwords for each of these accounts. Don’t be ashamed if that’s you because many people do it. Just be prepared to listen.
If you use the same, simple passwords for all of your accounts, you are making yourself much more vulnerable to an attack. This means that threat actors can work their way into your personal or business accounts and wreak havoc on your life and your company. If you want to minimize the chances of this happening, then you need to know how passwords can be stolen and the best ways to protect them.
How Do Attackers Get People’s Passwords?
To understand the best ways to protect your passwords, you need to know how attackers acquire them in the first place. Their methods can be simple, such as looking at the Post-It notes on someone’s monitor, or they may work in a place where they have access to customer passwords (such as the operators you talk to when you call up your bank). If these individuals abuse their positions and save customer passwords, they can try to use them on other accounts owned by the same customer, which is why you should have separate passwords for each account.
Read the rest of this post »