Choosing a password

A password needs to be secure, but something you can remember.

General Guidelines

Passwords are an essential component of the security of CAEDM. We therefore impose restrictions on the passwords you can choose for an account to improve your security and lessen the likelihood of a malicious attack on your account.

• Create a password with the CAEDM Account Adder
• Change your password in the Change My Password page

Restrictions

• Your password must be at least eight characters long.
• Two of the characters must not be letters
• One of the characters must be a letter
• You must choose from the following characters for your password:

  A-Z
  a-z
  0-9
  . (period)
  ! (exclamation mark)
  ? (question mark)
  + (plus)
  _ (underscore)
  : (colon)
  - (hyphen)

Helpful Hints and Tricks

Change letters to numbers that look the same (e.g., zero for 'o', five for 's', six for 'b'):

  bestevah => be5t3v4h
  securepassword => 5ecurepa55w0rd

Change the case of letters; since passwords are case-sensitive, this makes them harder to guess:

  superstar22 => sUpeRstAr22
  i1uvgran0la => i1UVgran0LA

Make use of the symbols; they could look like a letter (get creative):

  mydogspot => myc!ogspo+
  madhatter => madha++er

Choose phonetic equivalences (things that sound the same):

  toocoolforyou => 2cool4u
  iwonmyfirstrace => i1my1strace
  gettysburg84 => ghetteezbyrg8e4

Use longer phrases, abbreviated down with acronyms:

  my very excellent mother just made us nine pizzas! => mvemjmu9p!
  seventy-six jackdaws love my big sphinx of quartz => 76jlmbsoq

Bad Examples

   smith01 (too short)
   mydogspot (all letters)
   cravasse (a word found in the dictionary)
   wendymerrill (a guessable name)

   See the list of this year's worst passwords

Guidelines

• Never give your password to anyone.
• Never write your password down (at least, not entirely; write down part of it, or a hint, if it's too hard for you to remember, but keep part of it secret in your mind).
• Don't choose things that people who know something about you would guess (girlfriend's name, birthdate, social security number, etc.).
• Don't reuse passwords in more than one place. This is generally good practice; if someone steals your password from a no-name blog with no security, it would be bad for that to be the password to your bank account, too.

Notes

• Passwords are here to help you be secure!
• Everyone is required to change their passwords annually. Exceptions are not made to this policy.