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Old 06-25-2016, 12:35 PM   #1
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Password strength and security

Today I received an email from Toyota RAV4 Forums notifying me that I and all other members have been issued a new password due to a data breach of VerticalScope.com. I signed in with my new password and then followed their directions in their Notice of Data Breach on changing my password to one of my own choosing and how to make my password unique and strong.

They recommend using 10 or more characters with a mixture of upper-and-lower case letters, numbers and symbols... and to not use the same password for multiple online accounts... and to change passwords periodically.

After updating my password on Toyota RAV4 Forums, I then upgraded my password on AirForums and improved its strength, which seems more important than ever in light of the increasing DDOS and brute force attacks seen on AirForums recently and throughout the internet.

This seems like a good time to remind members to review their password strength and security.
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Old 06-25-2016, 12:40 PM   #2
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Absolutely. Use a longish password that is hard to guess. It does not have to be random. A few different short English words strung together with numbers and a symbol is hard to guess. The trick is to make it as long as a site will put up with.

I had a friend that used a line of Vietnamese poetry, in English characters. It was his favorite, long, and for him easy to remember. A computer password cracker program would not have come up with it because if the length.

I made my living as a paid paranoid in the computer security end of the business. Still do.




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Old 06-25-2016, 12:42 PM   #3
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Great reminder.

Something else to think about: passwords

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Old 06-25-2016, 03:40 PM   #4
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I wondered about that.

Verticalscope bought a bunch of enthusiast forums a month or so ago.

Not too impressed that they're having data security issues.
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Old 06-25-2016, 04:12 PM   #5
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Llando88 View Post
I wondered about that.

Verticalscope bought a bunch of enthusiast forums a month or so ago.

Not too impressed that they're having data security issues.
So this is why I got an email about changing my PW at another site a couple of weeks ago . . .

I don't use that forum much any more so I am going to let that sleeping dog lie for a while . . .

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Old 06-25-2016, 04:17 PM   #6
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Only if you don't reuse that password elsewhere.....


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Old 06-25-2016, 04:19 PM   #7
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In today's world, the password should be at least 10 digits, and include upper and lower case letters plus numbers. Used to be 8 digits was enough; no more. Soon 12 digits will be the norm.
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Old 06-25-2016, 05:25 PM   #8
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Some places are requiring 16 now. (Sigh)


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Old 06-25-2016, 07:21 PM   #9
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Old 06-25-2016, 08:40 PM   #10
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Here's a link to a news article with details on the VerticalScope hack.
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Old 06-25-2016, 10:36 PM   #11
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Phoenix View Post
Here's a link to a news article with details on the VerticalScope hack.
Thanks, Phoenix, for this link to zdnet.com's news article, "Hacker steals 45 million accounts from hundreds of car, tech, sports forums," that includes this brief excerpt:

"Many of the forums ran versions of vBulletin software dating back to 2007. Most were running software versions that were easily exploitable by hackers with known vulnerabilities."

This article underscores the importance of having a strong password, changing it periodically, and not using the same password on multiple online sites!
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Old 06-26-2016, 08:36 AM   #12
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Thanks for this discussion, password changed.
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Old 06-26-2016, 11:46 AM   #13
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Quote:
Originally Posted by SilverGate View Post
Today I received an email from Toyota RAV4 Forums notifying me that I and all other members have been issued a new password due to a data breach of VerticalScope.com. I signed in with my new password and then followed their directions in their Notice of Data Breach on changing my password to one of my own choosing and how to make my password unique and strong.

They recommend using 10 or more characters with a mixture of upper-and-lower case letters, numbers and symbols... and to not use the same password for multiple online accounts... and to change passwords periodically.

After updating my password on Toyota RAV4 Forums, I then upgraded my password on AirForums and improved its strength, which seems more important than ever in light of the increasing DDOS and brute force attacks seen on AirForums recently and throughout the internet.

This seems like a good time to remind members to review their password strength and security.
When I received the email mentioned above, telling me my password had been reset, it included a link to a webpage where I could change my password to one of my own liking. I was impressed that they also included this good advice: "If you suspect this email is a scam, you can confirm the legitimacy of this email by manually navigate to the forum URL yourself and use your new password to log in."

This good advice is further explained in The Seattle Times article of June 24, 2016:

"Instructed to reset password? How to avoid being phished"
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Old 06-27-2016, 06:39 AM   #14
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A method I have used for years. Pretend you are a novelist preparing a new novel, invent a persona, give them a history, a life, make it as real as you can. Then let the new character pick the password. That way even someone that may know you very well will not be able to guess and you can still remember it easy. And of course, apply the above suggestions about a mixture of symbols.
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Old 06-27-2016, 09:29 AM   #15
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Feeling better with a stronger password

So after I changed and made my password stronger on Toyota RAV4 Forums, I went to do the same at AirForums. Doing this was long overdue, since I hadn't changed my password since I joined 10 years ago, but it was important to do since we now live in a world with daily cyber-security issues. I was a bit rusty on how to change my password on AirForums, but once I did it, I felt better... and it was easy and here's how I did it:

1. Sign in to AirForums with your current password.
2. Near the top is a dark blue toolbar that has the words "User CP, Clubs, Venders," etc.
3. Click on "User CP"
4. Under the column "YOUR CONTROL PANEL" scroll down to "Settings & Options"
5. Click on "Edit Email and Password"
6. Enter your password, new password, confirmation of new password and click on "Save Changes."
7. Feel better!
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Old 06-27-2016, 11:41 PM   #16
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Here a quick tip about passwords. I know we have a lot, and it is recommend not to have the same passwords. But we all tend to forget. Here are some basics:

1. Uppercase, Lowercase, number and special character is the minimum via 8-10 digits.
2. To help remember use a cypher. For example: Your BFF in Ohio High School was Johnny and YOU played soccer, jersey number 21: So your password cypher can be something like this:
Hsbfsoccer! which your actual password is Ohiojohnny21! - It can be whatever you want it to be. So in your contacts, you put the place of your password. So you can say Bank (don't specify which bank) then inside the contacts, in the notes section, you put the cypher.
3. Here is the breakdown of the cypher Capital 'H' to remind you the first letter is CAPs, it can be where ever of course.
4. Hs should remind you of High School, Ohio
5. bf should remind you of your BFF Johnny
6. soccer should remind you of the jersey number
7. '!' exclamation point to let you know of the special character at the end.

I hope this helps you remember the every confusing password requirements.
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Old 06-28-2016, 04:46 AM   #17
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Password protection or more importantly data and identity protection via passwords is in crisis mode right now. Millions of attacks on systems ever day. Our son and our daughter both work in this field for different companies and each company is "hit" by hackers literally a million or more times per day.

A good solid VPN can help individuals the same as it helps major companies so I would suggest folks look into a VPN for their home and travel computers. Then in addition as my IT folks when I worked always had me have everyone with a computer change their passwords monthly - those who did not change could not log in after 31 days. We had millions of attacks, or so I was told, but no breaches and no lose of data, so I was told as my knowledge of such things goes back to trying to find a clean phone booth in Newark NJ as a new sales person.

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Old 06-28-2016, 08:55 AM   #18
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Originally Posted by paiceman View Post
Password protection or more importantly data and identity protection via passwords is in crisis mode right now. Millions of attacks on systems ever day...

A good solid VPN can help individuals the same as it helps major companies so I would suggest folks look into a VPN for their home and travel computers. Then in addition as my IT folks when I worked always had me have everyone with a computer change their passwords monthly - those who did not change could not log in after 31 days...

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Old 06-29-2016, 10:02 AM   #19
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Protecting your password from hackers

In the news today: The Economic Times, June 29, 2016:

"Six steps to protect your password from hackers"
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Old 06-30-2016, 07:01 PM   #20
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Lots of good advice here about passwords and security. Just a simple reminder to use unique passwords at various places, most especially banking and similar sites. At the forum we don't store any financial info about members or paypal logins, etc but it merits saying again that you need to be careful everywhere.

As a side note - I have wondered about the merits of leaving my camper unlocked when parked at home. I might rather lose the contents than have the door damaged...
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