This article teaches you why you should never allow a web browser to save your password. It is important for people working online to secure important information. One of the main ways of doing so is by securing their passwords. There are so many bad people out there wanting to get a grasp of your password(s). If you let them do so, you will be in a lot of trouble. Many bad things that can be done to your hacked account. Not forgetting that a lot of evil can also be committed using your account. It is thus important to protect your passwords at all costs. Most browsers prompt people to save their passwords. This is not safe at all, especially on a public network.
Important Tips About Passwords
- Do not allow a browser to save any password especially on public computers.
- Make use of very strong passwords.
- Use a combination of alphabets, numbers, special characters, uppercase, and lowercase.
- Avoid using short passwords.
- Do not use your names, ID number, phone number, passport number or such easy things to guess.
- More importantly, do not forget your password.
Be on High Alert
Since you will never know when you will fall victim to these bad guys, it is always advisable to be on high alert. You should always be on your guard as this can help prevent incidences that will leave you wishing you knew. As they say, you better be safe than sorry. There is a lot of cyber-crime of late and the sad thing is that the problems keep on increasing instead of going down. Being careful with your password and how you handle it is the only way to be secure. You should also not give out your password to anyone unless a very trusted person.
Be Careful on How You Handle Your Password(s)
Luckily you do not have to undergo any costs when securing your passwords. You only have to be careful about how you handle them as you work online. You have seen browsers requesting to remember your passwords. Yes, this seems like a very good idea to you because you will not be typing or entering the passwords once you want to log in to that specific website. This can help you save some time but let me assure you that this is not a really good idea. Why? So you may ask.
Why You Should Never Allow Browser Save Your Password
Never allow your browser to save your password. Passwords saved by your browser are very easy to retrieve. Then the person can do whatever harm he or she wants with your account. If it is a personal computer, then there is no problem allowing the browser to remember those passwords. Only then you must make sure you do not give out your machine to dubious characters.
Be Careful When You are in an Internet Cafe
In places like cyber cafes, allowing the computer you are using to remember a password will be tantamount to giving out your passwords. Remember these are public computers accessed by many people in a day. That option for ‘remember my password‘ should be a big NO! NO! Also, be careful when typing your password especially if the place is not secluded. There might be some peeping Toms around. Let them not get your password so easily, at least they should struggle if they are to get it.
Make Use of Private Browsing
Private browsing is a privacy feature found in most web browsers. When in private browsing, the browser creates a temporary session that is not connected to the browser’s main session and user data. What is most important is that browsing history is not saved. Also, local data associated with the session for instance cookies are cleared when the session is ended. Any other user who sits on the machine will not be able to access any data or history on what you were doing.
How to Open Private Browser
While using Mozilla Firefox, you can access the private browser by pressing Ctrl+Shift+P on your keyboard while Mozilla is open. For chrome, use the shortcut Ctr+Shift+New and you will land in incognito mode. Note that the private mode can also be accessed from the menu in the upper-right corner.
Do Not Use Simple Passwords
You should never use simple passwords that are easy to guess such as any of your names, very short passwords, numbers like 1,2,3, …, identification number, Passport number, phone number, among others. A good password will be a combination of numbers, special characters, and alphabets. For alphabets, combine upper case and lower case.
A strong password will always be hard to crack. Now, something worth noting is that after creating your password, make sure you do not forget it. Forgetting your password is akin to losing your house or car keys.
Retrieving Saved Passwords on Chrome
It is very easy to retrieve a saved password from Google Chrome and other browsers. For instance, for those who use Chrome, it is very easy to recall or to see your saved passwords. To check this just type this on your browser, ‘chrome://settings/passwords’. A list of sites with saved and unsaved passwords will be displayed. From there on you just click on the extreme right-hand side and select show password. Your password will be there in black and white for all to see.
Retrieving Saved Passwords on Mozilla
To access the saved passwords for Mozilla Firefox click on the menu icon (usually 3 bars on the top right-hand side). Click on Options > Security > Saved Logins.
