Amazon Reset Some User Passwords; Tips to Elevate Your Password Security

There is some big Black Friday news to report and it’s not that super sale at your favorite retailer.  Amazon has sent messages to some of its customers that their passwords may have been leaked accidentally.

The number of affected accounts is not known, but if Amazon thought you were included it has set your account to force you to reset your password in an "abundance of caution." However, it’s a good idea to do some preventative password changing for Amazon accounts, even if it isn’t required by the company.

Creating strong passwords:

• Use strong passwords or phrases. This means to use a combination of letters and numbers, as well as special characters. Use upper and lower case letters.

• Refrain from using dictionary words, in any language, and make them as difficult to guess as possible. The more they look like a jumble of characters, the better.

• Don’t reuse passwords and phrases for multiple online sites. The criminals count on this, so make each site a different user name and password combination.

• To create unique passwords, it isn’t as difficult as you might dread. For example, keep a base password or phrase of at least 6 characters and then use information from the sites you have accounts with and bookend the base password with the first two or last two characters of the site. If you prefer, you could also bookend your phrase.  Start with T@z29# as your base. If the site is Amazon, your password might become “ANT@z29#” or AT@z29#n.

• Another method may be to choose a base phrase of random words and string them together. The trick is that they shouldn’t make sense together. For example, you could start with “MilkbOOmerangGaraGe” and add different special characters depending on the site. Just make them easy for you, but no one else to remember or guess.

• If you must write them down, however, keep the list completely separate from your computer.

Why does my password have to be so difficult?

It is so important that passwords are difficult to crack because hackers will try brute force attacks. This is when they try every possible combination of logically sequenced letters to guess them. The more difficult they are, the longer it takes. At some point, either the hacker will give up or the software they are using won’t be able to get to it in a reasonable amount of time.

2

You may wonder what happens when account information is stolen. Hackers try the user name and password combination on many sites to see if they work. They may take the details from Amazon and try it on eBay or PayPal or both. They may also try it on financial institution websites. That’s why it’s so important to use strong unique passwords.

They may also sell the information to spammers and phishers. So remember not to open links or attachments in unexpected email messages or those from senders you don’t recognize.

It’s important to note that there is no indication of a breach into the Amazon network. Instead, the company says that some password information may have been transmitted from “some” devices in an insecure manner. Details as to what exactly happened has not been made public yet, but Amazon has stated that the issue that caused this has been corrected.