But Changing Passwords is a Hassle!
September 23, 2010We have all probably heard that it makes sense to periodically change the passwords on our accounts that we access online. Sure, like I have time to change all the passwords for both my wife and I. And besides, who could possibly figure out the crazy things I think of. I thought that by being extremely clever once, I could stop any hacker from invading my online accounts and at the same time, not have to worry about thinking up new passwords all the time.
As you probably have surmised, even experts make mistakes. It happened as I was double-checking my checking account – as I always do- and I noticed a lot of charges made to a certain vendor. And I mean A LOT!!
First thing I did was contact the bank and let them know that I was disputing all the charges and they were quite nice actually. I then contacted the vendor and let them know that these charges were not mine and that somehow someone must have gotten a hold of my information and charged away. After they took my dispute request, they asked me a question that I honestly had no answer for:
“Mr. Young, when was the last time you changed your password?” Uhh, gulp.
Now I got lucky. I didn’t lose any money in this lesson and I dealt with some very nice people but it could have easily gone against me. So how often should a person change their passwords? At minimum every six months is a good measure but to be safe, probably every 90 days should be sufficient. And of course you don’t want to use anything that would be easy to guess, i.e. birthday, SSN, etc.
That said, I need to go change a password or two.