Ensure That Your Digital Estate Is Protected
A password is your digital key. It unlocks your accounts, from personal (like social media) to financial (like your savings accounts) to technical (like your cellphone). Have you created a strong block between you and unwanted visitors?
Review your passwords to address these 6 things:
- Do not use personal information. Your mom’s maiden name and your birthday make terrible passwords. These are publicly available, and are often targets of cyber criminals.
- Do not use real words. Password-cracking tools often use a dictionary to try to guess your password. Instead, use special characters, such as $ or &, mixed with misspellings or numbers.
- Do not use short passwords. Many programs require passwords of at least nine characters. A good minimum is 10.
- Do not remain stagnant. Avoid a data breach before it happens: Make a quarterly effort to update your passwords to stay ahead of hackers.
- Do not use the same password across multiple accounts. This one is obvious. If a hacker gets one password, they have the potential to open multiple programs.
- Do not type them on public devices or networks. Using public Wi-Fi? Avoid visiting your bank sites.
Password tricks:
- Modify easy-to-remember phrases. If you have a favorite song title, change the characters to meet the guidelines we shared above. For example: “Purple Rain” becomes “Pu$pl3R@in.”
- Transform a sentence into a password. Take a phrase that’s meaningful to you, especially one that has proper nouns (which are harder to crack), and transform it by using just the first few letters of each word. For example, “I wear Nikes when I walk to Jen’s” becomes “IweNiwhIwa2J.”
Protect Your Digital Estate
Have you planned for how your digital assets will be distributed when you’re gone (who has access and who receives anything with financial or sentimental value, for example)? Our team at the Schoolcraft College Foundation focuses on estate planning and how to distribute your assets to the loved ones and loved causes you care most about. We would love to talk about how a gift to support the Foundation through your estate can make a big difference. Simply contact Dawn Dyer Magretta, CFRE at dmagrett@schoolcraft.edu or 734-462-4619 to learn more.