Remember passwords

[willowman]

Mrs W and I are registered with about 40 internet sites between us.
We are told that to be secure we should have a different password for each site, and we should not write them down.
Sorry, but I am getting on a bit and the memory isn't what it was, so has anybody any bright suggestions as to how we can think of 40 easily remembered passwords, and how we can remember which goes with which site.

[4candles]

I use a "common core" of characters, with the first and last letters of the organisation before and after.
eg - txyz123o for Tesco, mxyz123t for Microsoft, bxyz123a for Barclays etc.

[Jillius]

Willowman, I know what you mean ! I used to have them all in a little book but would then worry in case we got burgled so what i do now is keep the same password but just put a number after it. ( a different number for each website) You could keep this safely written down as it would only show the number and not the entire password.

[wirraldene]

I use Password Agent from here: http://www.moonsoftware.com/pwagent.asp
It has one master password and unlimited entries for any info
you want to keep e.g. credit cards, accounts, passwords etc.

[Buenchico]

The problem with software-based solutions, such as Password Agent, is that if your hard drive fails you've lost all of your passwords.

The simplest solution is to list them all in a Word document. Then go to Tools > Options. Click on the Security tab and set a password for opening the document. (Don't forget that master password!). Save the document with an innocuous title (such as 'Wedding Speech') to deter anyone from spending hours trying to hack the password. Keep the Word document on your hard drive but make a back-up copy onto a floppy or a CD, so that you won't lose the list if your hard drive crashes.

Chris

[wirraldene]

Good Point Chris.

There is a very easy and quick facility on P/Agent to do a backup to anywhere, which I do regularly. A Print and Export option is also given.

[fo3nix]

Depending on what the passwords are for, Buenchico's idea can be good or bad.

It's fine if the passwords are low security, to this website for example. It's very, very bad if it's for your bank's website, or something similar that stores your credit card and other details.

My suggestion: use KeePass:

http://keepass.info/download.html
(1.09 windows installer from that page)

It's a free and open source application that stores your passwords in a single file that is highly encrypted. As good as or better than your bank probably uses.

You can add as many passwords as you like, and it even has a generator for you, so that you can use totally random passwords for all websites, if you so wish (also recommended).

You can then press a simple keyboard shortcut, and it'll load that site and log you in with your stored details automatically. So it's simple to use, too.

Then, all you need to do is remember one password/pass phrase. (Using a random sentance that means nothing special is better than a password.)

Because it's saved to a single file, you can then copy this file to a CD or back it up to an external hard drive, or even just email it to yourself every so often. It's highly encrypted, so there's no worry if you lose it, and having a backup means that you shouldn't get into any trouble if your hard drive fails.

[willowman]

Thanks everybody, some useful ideas to think about.

[WoWo]

I certainly wouldn't advise them all being kept in one place with a single password protecting them. Two reasons for that firstly all the hacker has to do is break one password and then they have full access to everything, secondly you won't be able to remember what site goes with which password so not only will the passwords be exposed but also where to use them.

If I was a hacker the first thing I would do would be to write a program to identify password program, regardsless of name.

There are 2 things you should do, first is come up with a replacement system as 4candles suggests. Then again link the password with the site. For banking/Credit Cards I'd go for something totally unrealted to the site, that will definately be worth remembering.

[ACtheTROLL]

the best way to remember passwords (for me at least)
is to use 4candles method

exactly how you apply it is a personal thing .....

I apply different levels of "security"

so the base is
password
then pa56word
pass56word
pass195651word
(date of birth)
that way ... you can work through the options and get there eventually

[PhilLew]

I use the same password for all of my low level security sites but use car registration numbers for higher level sites.

I associated each site with a particular old car I've had and then I can recall it's reg number. This gives a very secure alpha-numeric mix which is difficult to hack and, as long as you don't use your current car, very difficult for anyone who knows you to guess unlike DoB of children's names.

You can write down a list of cars and reg numbers and no body will know what it's for except you, then all you have to do is remember which car is for which site!