Has your account been compromised?
Table of Contents
Introduction
Staying secure online these days is more than having a good password. With the amount of data breaches taking place its possible that you’ll find your personal information and password in what they call a Dump or Data Dump.
A Data Dump is where an attacker has successfully compromised a website like Gmail and has extracted the users and password.
You might be wondering “Has an account of mine been found in one of these Data Dumps?”. Luckly there’s an awesome site called Have I Been Pwned that tracks if your email has shown up in any of the dumps.
My email address has found itself in a dump more than a few times.
Have I Been Pwned will also tell you what kind of data was discoverd in the dump. This will give you a good idea if you should change your password for the service.
Another critical point to think about.
Are you using the same password for different services?
A large majority of why peoples accounts get hack is through password reuse. One password is found in a data dump and tested on every other site.
Password Management
This is where a password managers comes into play.
Password Mangers work by using one password to unlock a vault of all your other passwords. Managers can run on your phone, laptop and even your browser. Think Lord of the Rings, one password to rule them all.
Most if not all managers have a password generator you can use. Instead of coming up with a password, pass that responsibility off to the password manager.
I never think about the password I generate. I make sure its long and complex enough and ensure I have it saved in my password manager. Password Managers take the burden off your brain and increase the security of your accounts in one place.
Actionable Steps
Try some password managers
I personally use Bitwarden
You can also checkout
When making a password for your manager leverage a passphrase. A passphrase is a long, memorable, and secure series of words (and sometimes numbers or symbols). Generally more secure and easier to remember.
Example Passphrase: MySecurePassphraseThatYoullNeverGuess123!!!