Last month I spoke about a website, passwordbird, that users could use to generate strong and nearly unbreakable passwords. Although passwordbird is really good tool to use I was asked by a friend how do I know when a password is good enough? Some of the general rules of thumb that I go by is not to use anything that can be easily guessed by someone close to you. For example, I’ll never use my name, a family members name, birthdate, or any word that you could find in the dictionary.

So how do I create my passwords? I typically create a password that has a combination of letters, numbers and symbols; yes I said symbols. This makes it harder for anyone to crack my password. I then test my password on passwordmeter. Passwordmeter (www.passwordmeter.com) will tell you how strong your password is. The site will give you a breakdown of how they calculated your password score which is really helpful.

Go to the site and test out your password. Is it really as strong or secure as you thing it is? You may be surprised how weak the password really is. If you find it really difficult to create a password, I suggest using the combination of passwordbird and passwordmeter to help you out.