This week’s episode is on password managers, and was inspired by the U.K. potentially outlawing weak passwords.

A recent article highlights the enormous concern around password security and the every growing plethora of smart devices that are working their way into our lives.  This includes devices such as smart locks, smart thermostats, and pretty much any other device that connects to our WIFI network.  The problem has to do with the weak security protocols and passwords built-in to these devices.  Many of them don’t encrypt their data, and also come from the factory with passwords that we cannot change. When it comes to a smart device, folks by-and-large want to unbox it, plug it in and start using it; changing passwords and updating firmware are simply not on the agenda. So therein lies rub: smart devices that connect to the internet through the WIFI, passwords that are either already known by would-be hackers or easily cracked by them and users that are sadly none-the-wiser.

I’m reminded by the 2017 casino data breach in which cybercriminals hacked the smart thermometers in a casino’s fishtanks to steal 10GB of data.  Who would have thought that thermometers would have been the vulnerability?  And who would have thought that the best way to spread this message would be hitting the like button for the algorithm.

Now I think we can all see here that any potential weak password legislation passed by the U.K. or anyone else would impact the design of these devices and increase our ability to secure them.  And so it will still rest on us as the owners of these smart devices to ensure we setup and use them safely and securely. Which means we will still need complex passwords.  Our passwords will still need to be unique from device to device and from account to account.  And those passwords still need to be stored securely, and recalled quickly

The solution to all these problems is a password manager.

  • No more thinking up passwords to meet the ever growing list of password complexity requirements.
  • No more recording them insecurely in a book or spreadsheet
  • No more trying to sort through the endless password lists, or trying to remember them.
  • You don’t even want to type you passwords!
  • No more wasting your time doing any of these things!

A good password manager can generate complex passwords for you, they’ll all be unique random passwords, it will store them safely on your systems and in the cloud, and also be able to plug them automatically when you need them.

Get a password manager!  At Engler IT we trust Password Boss.  Check’em out! Get Password Boss today! https://bit.ly/3iVI3Q0