Hello and welcome to the Information Security Awareness Program created by Information Technology Services at Cincinnati State.
This program’s primary focus is to inform the college community regarding information security topics,
so you can do your part to keep our data and systems safe.
This video, Username & Password Security, is part of a collection of videos that make up the Information Security Awareness Program.
You can find the entire Information Security Program online at www.cincinnatistate.edu/InformationSecurity
This video will cover the following five topics:
1) Overview
2) Strong Passwords
3) Secret Question
4) Never use "Save my password"!
5) Password Managers
A username uniquely identifies you in a system. When that username is combined with a password,
it gives you access to systems and data. Often, the data in these systems range from public/non-securable
to sensitive/highly-securable. For more information, see the Information Security Awareness document Sensitive Data.
Username security is often overlooked when thinking about security while online, with more emphasis given to passwords.
An easy step to take to keep your username secure is to not let your computer automatically remember your username.
If someone gains access to this, they have one of two pieces of data they need to impersonate you.
Usernames aren’t typically highly securable pieces of data. An example of this is usernames here at Cincinnati State.
Employee John Doe could have a username of john.doe. If you know John’s name, you can easily determine his username,
resulting in a very low securable piece of information. A password is combined with a username to gain access to system or data.
This makes your password a highly- securable piece of information and should be protected.
Never write down your password and store it in a non-secure location.
Strong passwords are very important in keeping your system credentials safe.
Here are a few suggestions that can help you create strong passwords.
Length: Make sure the length of your passwords are eight or more characters.
Complexity: Include special characters such as punctuation, symbols, and numbers. Use the entire keyboard, not just the letters
and characters you use or see most often. The greater the variety of characters in your password, the better. Example: Fw8!vZ#pP4*
Variation: To keep strong passwords effective, change them often.
Set an automatic reminder to change your passwords every three months.
Variety: Don't use the same password for everything. Cybercriminals steal passwords on websites that have very little security,
and use that same password in more secure environments, such as banking websites.
Have you ever wondered about the strength of your password? Test it on Microsoft’s Safety & Security Center @ .
www.microsoft.com/security/pc-security/ password-checker.aspx
Websites often ask you to provide an answer to one or more secret question(s).
It is important to use information that isn’t readily available from your Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn accounts.
If you use readily available secret questions, your credentials could easily be compromised.
Many websites have the feature to automatically save your username and password.
Although this is convenient, it is extremely insecure! It's very easy for someone to sit at your computer and access your systems.
You should never have websites or systems remember your passwords automatically.
If you have questions regarding this or any other information security topic, call the ITS Helpdesk @ 513-569-1234.