Password Security

Hackers and malware continue to constantly plague Internet users and ISPs. As recent as last week, the public was not able to access major websites such as Twitter, Netflix, and Amazon for several hours. This downtime occurred as a result of  DYN.com, a popular provider for commercially managed DNS services, which had been experiencing a massive DDoS attack resulting in the downtime of these popular sites.  A domain name server has the ability to change an easy to remember name such as interserver.net into a series of numbers known as an IP address. This is comparable to searching for a random phone number in a phone book.

These attackers were able to successfully pull off a major DDoS attack as a result of human error for example someone forgetting to change their passwords on their Internet devices. These devices known as “Internet Of Things” are everyday objects that connect to the Internet. When you initially set-up many of these devices, you are provided with a default password. If the owner of his/her ‘Internet of Things’ forgets to change the default password then hackers will be able to search the web for default passwords to your device. This will enable hackers to take control of your device and utilize them for their purposes. Your device can end up a part of a larger botnet used in a major DDoS attack.

The premise of this article is to inform our followers about the importance of password security. We highly recommend changing default passwords into something more complex in order to deter hackers. There has been countless times where someone’s web service is compromised as a result of having used passwords like “Password123” or their birthdate. Of course, it may be difficult to remember long and complicated passwords, so we suggest using password managers. Instead of having to memorize a bunch of passwords, you can have all of your passwords in one secure place. If everyone took the necessary steps to ensure password security it would in turn minimize the impact and damage of major caused by DDoS attacks.