Best Practice For Your Passwords

You hear the ping and see the notification – YOUR PASSWORD WILL EXPIRE –  and that immediate feeling of dread settles in.

How difficult will it be this time to set a password? Which characters can I use? How many old passwords do I have to bypass?

There is a method behind the maddening nature of password resets, no matter how annoying it might end up being.

According to a 2019 Google & Harris Poll, 52% of users say they reuse the same password for multiple (but not all) accounts, while 13% of users reuse the same password for all their accounts. Between January and March 2019, Microsoft’s threat research team scanned all Microsoft user accounts and found that “44 million users were employing usernames and passwords that leaked online following security breaches at other online services.” In 2019, it was also reported that 42% of companies were breached by a bad password. A potential breach could cost you and your companies an unimaginable amount of time and money. Just how much though? We are glad you asked. In 2020, IBM and the Ponemon Institute Report that the average cost of a data breach is 3.86 million dollars.

The IBM & Ponemon study goes on to state that “nearly 40% of the average total cost of a data breach stem from lost business – including increased customer turnover, lost revenue due to system downtime and increased cost of acquiring new business due to diminished reputation.” It can all start with a compromised password – make sure you take that extra few minutes to come up with a new, complex password. Microsoft suggests at least 12 characters, a combination of case sensitive letters with numbers and symbols mixed in.

Shy away from the repeated passwords, names of fictional characters, family, friends. Take the extra step to protect yourself and your company.