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Please do not post about your password. It best not to give any information about it so that it's harder to guess.

For people who don't like large blocks of text.

  • Get a strong password Here or by slapping the keyboard but include numbers, symbols and uppercase letters.
  • Memorize your password by practicing typing it and using muscle memory.
  • Make sure that your password is unique; therefore, not used anywhere else. Not other sites. A Gaia-only password
  • Never ever ever tell anyone your password, ever! Not your friends, not your siblings, not another member, not a moderator, not even Lanzer


If any thread linked to this thread, it doesn't mean that I endorse them in anyway.


And for people who like large blocks of text and more detail, read ahead.

Passwords are like underwear - change them daily and do not share them amongst your friends (or enemies). Actually, underwear should be changed daily, and most sites suggest that one should change their password every 3-6 months. Also, continuing their analogy, would you want underwear that has holes in it? No, you'd want strong underwear and thus a strong password.

So.

Why are passwords so important?
If we lived in Eden, we probably wouldn't have to worry about anyone lying about who they are, and we could trust everyone. However, they are many people that enjoy hacking into other account and stealing their items. I've gotten many reports from users that were hacked, and it's sad; they lost all their items, and all their hard work was wasted. You wouldn't want that to happen to you?

What is a strong password?
A strong password is a password that is almost impossible to guess. It's a simple matter of combinations. Let's say that we can only make passwords from 0's and 1's and it can only be 2 digits long. The possible passwords are: 0, 1, 00, 01, 10, 11
That is a very short list of passwords! It would only take 6 guesses to try all possible passwords.
Gaia Online allows (95 different characters):
  • A-Z, a-z
  • 0-9
  • space
  • !@#$%^&*()_+-=`~,./<>?;':"[]{}|

And a length between 6 and 32 characters.
This results in exactly 1957722449314639324001767020679119195924659428048007023884390625 different possible passwords. That's a lot more than 6, right?

However, some of these passwords are better than others.

For example, hotdog is a terrible password. It's six letters long (the shortest possible password), it contains only lowercase letters and is a word in the dictionary.

Strong passwords have
  • Uppercase
  • Lowercase
  • Numbers
  • Symbols
  • Are not found in the dictionary
  • Are unique
  • Do not contain any part of the username

An example of a strong password (DO NOT USE THESE PASSWORDS) would be $ZD7p}bq or NR%C+r@". They appear to be quite random, right? That's the point; to make the password so random that the only way to guess these passwords would be to try around 6*10^15 times. Even if I had a computer that could try a million passwords a second, it would take over 200 years to crack these passwords. That sounds strong enough for me.

I'd would also like to expand on the section that mentions that strong passwords must be unique. This means to use a single password for a single use and nothing else. That means that when you're making a strong password for Gaia Online, please do not use the same password as your email, computer login, social-networking sites or other forums. It may sound annoying and hard at first but it's well worth it. If one fails to do this, then if one of the user accounts at any of the sites gets compromised, then all of them do. It's like using the same key to open all the locks that you own. If someone steals that key, they can take everything, instead of just one thing. Ideally, it would be best if nothing is ever compromised, but one should still plan for the worst case scenario.
Now, you could say, "But my password is strong, it can never be compromised, not in a million years." That may be so by conventional methods; however, sometimes the entire site itself is hacked and therefore the entire user manifest is available regardless of how strong their passwords are. This has happened recently to another site and has affected many users on Gaia Online. Please don't let it happen to you in the future.

How did I make these passwords? There are two ways. There's the method of slapping the keyboard, y#4we %4`y like so, but I prefer this method.

Here is a site that will generate passwords for you. But wait, that sounds unsafe, doesn't it? Because if a computer can generate this, then a computer can hack it, right? Wrong. This site uses entropy (random data) to help compile these passwords. There's also an Additional entropy box in which you can slap the keyboard, just incase you feel that their entropy gathering methods aren't good enough. I also like this site because it tells you how strong the password is; ranging from protecting you against whoever doesn't try to mortal civilizations.

Note. Normally, it's very unwise to trust random websites to generate or store passwords for you because you do not know what they will do with them. However, this site (since the last time I checked) has password-generating program client-side, which means that your computer randomly generates the password, not their computer(s). If you still feel that is unsafe, you can always slap the keyboard, but make sure to hold shift a few times and hit those numbers as well. If it looks too much like "ajhdiofgh", just add some numbers and symbols.

These passwords sound too confusing; how am I going to remember this? Hotdog, isn't that bad, I could make it ~h0td0g!
Muscle memory is your friend. Before you change your password, remember your new one first. Make a password and just start typing it down (when no one is around of course). Type it, until you can type it without looking (because, what's the point of a password if you have to look it up?). And while ~h0td0g! isn't a password, some hacking programs use net-speak to guess your password. Trust me, once you know the password in your muscle memory, you can just type it like no problem. It's just as easy as typing hotdog ^_~

Some people recommend writing down your password - others don't. There are two sides to this discussion. First, if you forget your password, you can always look it up; however, someone else could also find your password without them guessing it. They suggest that if you were to write down the password, you would write it on a small piece of paper and hide the paper somewhere safe that only you know about; or keep it with your other safe papers. Now, this is good practice for people in a company, but the average user on Gaia isn't that old and they probably have their younger silbings stealing money from them all the time. So, unless you are absolutely positive that no one can find your hiding spot, then use it - but with the warning, that they might find out. However, if you must write your password down - don't put it in a file on the computer!

And remember, do not share your password with anyone, even a Gaia Staff Member. A Gaia Staff Member will never ask for your password; even Lanzer.
Thank you! Now I have a STRONG password!
whoooooo

i used altimatch =o
It's a nice idea but I'm just not worried enough about pixelated goodness to try and remember. ^^ My password satisfies me and if someone wants to work to get my pitiful gold and items... I'd be sad but life would go on.

Vicious Warlord

Bad memory = No way

Vicious Warlord

Oh and by the way, using the "random" passwords is never a good idea, they are so easy to forget. The best thing to do is using numbers that you will never forget (the phonenumber of your mother combined with the birthday of your boyfriend and then with the name of you first Pony between that) The chances are *extremely* slim that someone who knows *so* much about you, would hack your account. For anyone else (ie: 5 billion people minus the few people who know you through and through) it will remain a case of "keep trying"
Aldo


Actually no.

Quote:
1.) Use a secure password (combo of letters and numbers, caps and lowercase. DO NOT use any words found in the dictionary).


That's all they say, I felt that I needed an extended tutorial to link in my signature. Since I'm a moderator and all, I figured that I could point to this thread whenever a user reports that they were hacked or something.

Aldo
Oh and by the way, using the "random" passwords is never a good idea, they are so easy to forget. The best thing to do is using numbers that you will never forget (the phonenumber of your mother combined with the birthday of your boyfriend and then with the name of you first Pony between that) The chances are *extremely* slim that someone who knows *so* much about you, would hack your account. For anyone else (ie: 5 billion people minus the few people who know you through and through) it will remain a case of "keep trying"

Actually, most hacks come from people that personally know the user in real life. They either leave themselves logged in and their brother/sister/friend uses their account. Sure there are other scams in which people give their password to some other outside website (hence the reason for the redirect page).

And like I stated earlier, muscle memory is your friend. If one types in a password for awhile, their fingers will just automatically go for those letters. Trust me, I have many different strong passwords for many accounts and I remember them all (sometimes I have to try two or three times if I forget which one ^^;; ). The difference will only be noticable during the first few days, but after than, it'll become natural. That's why I suggested that the user type the password over and over to get used to it. Practice makes perfect, right?

Vicious Warlord

Why didnt you guys just update the thread you allready have, @,@;; Now I gotta link to two places to give people the info they want. : (

As I said, most "friends" usually dont bother to remember your mother's phonenumber and if they do, its just...near impossible that someone who knows *so* much about you, would break into your belongings to steal some pixels.

And if I'd use all your tips, I would come with something like 4523##*&^#$%$34kfja;stj3407881

There is *no* way you will memorize that, nor the layout on your keyboard, sure it is an unbreakable code, but you will have to check back on your join-mail every other day.
The vast majority of hacking on Gaia is done by family members or very close friends. It's very sad, but people who know you best are the most likely to hack you, so using personal information for your password is not a good idea.

Vicious Warlord

Anlina S.
The vast majority of hacking on Gaia is done by family members or very close friends. It's very sad, but people who know you best are the most likely to hack you, so using personal information for your password is not a good idea.
A little brother usually gets in because someone forgot to log out. If the folks would actually work things out with their parents, rather than running to the mods, it would save ya guys some hard work and it would punish the evil brother a lot harder. ( grounded for a month, doing the laundrey for a week, stuff like that)

Oh, and if you are really close friends with your hackers, Im sure you can talk things out. >w<
Aldo
Why didnt you guys just update the thread you allready have, @,@;; Now I gotta link to two places to give people the info they want. : (

Because I wanted to have a link in my signature that just talked about having strong passwords. I sent a PM to the user that has the very long thread about everything (it's a very long thread). It's up to them whether or not they wish to link, or just quote what I had to say.

Aldo
And if I'd use all your tips, I would come with something like 4523##*&^#$%$34kfja;stj3407881

There is *no* way you will memorize that, nor the layout on your keyboard, sure it is an unbreakable code, but you will have to check back on your join-mail every other day.


8 digits of base-95 is a rather strong password. My Kerberos password for college is off that characteristic. I type it in everyday. Sure, for the first few days I actually had to look it up, but repetition has offered me the ability to remember the password. It's muscle memory. If you play a musical instrument, you'd probably know what I'm talking about.

And if anything, I'd rather spend 10 minutes typing a password over and over again to remember it, because it sure would be a lot more secure than hotdog or something ^_~

Also, it's strongly advised to log out after you're done.

Also, thanks Anlina S. I was guessing that most hacks were caused by those people, but not entirely sure. You're green; so you'd probably know ^^;;
*reads thread*
Yes, great job Paakun 3nodding There are so many hackings going on just because of carelessness, then they blame on you mods... Like this one thread I read today that a girl was asking if a mod went on and took her items, since they have special privlages.
Please keep notifying Gaia of anymore helpful tips. ^_^
Oooh, thanks. I now have a strong password 3nodding
Heh. Strangely enough I try to use all numbers. A lot more confusing if anyone is trying to watch, but a lot easier for a computer to hack, although the amount of chances is limited, so it would be blocked.

The best password I have is an old one for my school system. Since it's not in use anymore (and HELL as if I want to use it again) I can divulge. razz

078632143610796866881207816924599255271191219882271345407969626525

Eat THAT if you can razz Since I type around sixty words a minute, it's nothing short of a 'keyboard tango', if you catch my drift wink

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