Want to make a strong password that’s very hard to crack? Follow these steps:

This guideline is just a small part of the Security Awareness Training available for through our partners at KnowBe4 Security Training. For more information and to train all employees, please contact us for more information.

1. Think of a phrase or sentence with at least eight words. It should be something easy for you to remember but hard for someone who knows you to guess. It could be a line from a favorite poem, story, movie, song lyric, or quotation you like.

Example: I Want To Put A Dent In The Universe

2. Remove all but the first letter of each word in your phrase.

Example: IWTPADITU

3. Replace several of the uppercase letters with lowercase ones at random.

Example: iWtpADitU

4. Now substitute a number for at least one of the letters. (Here we’ve changed the lowercase “i” to the numeral “1.”)

Example: iWtpAD1tU

5. Finally, use special characters ($, &, +, !, @) to replace a letter or two—preferably a letter that is repeated in the phrase. You can also add an extra character to the mix. (Here we’ve replaced the “t” with “+” and added an exclamation point at the end.)

Example: iW+pAD1tU!

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