Do you use the same password for everything? Owning a small business means owning data. You’re constantly acquiring new information related to your clients, your financial details, and all the vendors with whom you work. One lucky hack, and you’ve just exposed your business to a hacker. I don’t know how I would sleep at night; losing the trust from my clients. So protecting your company from data theft should be a top priority and it’s the responsible thing to do. It comes down to one simple choice you make: passwords.
Are you guilty of using the same password for everything?
“It took not once, not twice, but three times before I realized how dumb I was for using the same password for just about everything. The third time, my entire identity was stolen. Now that only took once. How stupid could I be? After spending thousands of dollars to get my life and business back on track, I still don’t think my credit is 100% fixed. It was a MESS.” I get it, passwords are hard to remember, however, it’s SO easy to use an app that will encrypt your passwords for you. If you want to avoid weak passwords start by steering clear of the following list. Read on for passwords you should NEVER ever use. So take a little time to be proactive in securing your future.
Password
Arguably, this is the number-one and most common bad choice. Also prevalent are variations such as P@ssword and P@55w0rd!. These might be easy to remember, but they’re also among the first options hackers will try.
Repetitive keystrokes
Easy-to-guess passwords often take root because they’re simple to remember. That’s the story with this hacker-friendly option constructed from the sequence of letters at the top left of the typical computer keyboard.
Numbers
Really, using 12345 Or, 98765. Or, 4567. You get the picture— stay away from using consecutive numbers (and the same goes for sequential letter combinations). You can only count on passwords such as these to expose your business to digital theft.
Business Name
If your business is called GSD Creative, don’t set your password to be GSDcreative1. That would be an early choice for hackers looking to break into your valuable data.
Addresses
Skip it entirely, when it comes to passwords. Also avoid trying to mash together similar details, such as your street name and street number.
Date of Birth
Thanks to the Internet, it doesn’t take much effort to find a person’s DOB. Birthdays, years of birth— all of them make for readily attainable passwords and are poor choices for your company.
Simple Words
Especially if they’re related to your business, don’t use them. No flowers, drapery, lighting, photos, videos, you get the picture.
So, with all that to say, what should you do when it comes to picking a password? Use a safe encryption app service that keep your passwords safe and encrypted. Or you can have a strategy that you can remember for each website, however, the safest way is to rely on the APP to take care of this for you.
Next Steps: Give 1Password a try. It’s what we personally use in house and we have been loving it for many years!
