{"id":1893,"date":"2025-05-20T14:18:04","date_gmt":"2025-05-20T20:18:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.washk12.org\/tech\/?page_id=1893"},"modified":"2025-05-20T14:19:07","modified_gmt":"2025-05-20T20:19:07","slug":"secure-passwords","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.washk12.org\/tech\/secure-passwords\/","title":{"rendered":"Secure Passwords"},"content":{"rendered":"

Secure Passwords<\/h1>\n
\n

PASSWORD CREATION GUIDELINES<\/span><\/h2>\n

Passwords are challenging these days. \u00a0It is critically important to make a password secure, but sometimes that also makes it hard to remember. \u00a0We used to believe that to make a password more secure you would add more characters or change some letters to numbers and using a combination of uppercase and lowercase letters. \u00a0Interesting enough, doing those things doesn\u2019t make it much more difficult for a computer to guess your password. \u00a0What we knew yesterday about passwords, turns out, isn\u2019t accurate at all. \u00a0In the end, what makes more of a difference than anything is length.<\/p>\n

We use a specific term to measure the strength of a password: entropy. \u00a0For you math majors, the entropy is calculated by with the following function:<\/p>\n

\"Password<\/p>\n

Where E is password entropy, R is the total number of available characters, and L is length.<\/p>\n

If your not a math major, the issue is summed up fairly well in this comic from\u00a0XKCD<\/a><\/p>\n

(Disclaimer: the password entropy function used in this comic is slightly different, but the concept is still the same)<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Password<\/p>\n

https:\/\/xkcd.com\/936\/<\/a><\/p>\n

The best password you can make is 20-30 characters long made up of totally random characters. \u00a0Unfortunately, those are not always very easy to remember, because of that a better solution for most people is a password that is made up of several random words. \u00a0Long passwords are usually hard to remember, but because your brain only has to remember words instead of letters, numbers, symbols, and other punctuation, these are actually easier to remember, but (because of the length) harder for a computer to guess.<\/span><\/p>\n

If\u00a0<\/span>EFF\u00a0<\/span><\/a>produced a video that explains this concept and gives you a great idea on how to choose these random words.<\/p>\n

Video:\u00a0How to Make a Super-Secure Password<\/a><\/p>\n

WHAT ARE THE MINIMAL REQUIREMENTS FOR WCSD PASSWORDS?<\/span><\/h2>\n

Passwords should have at least 70 bits of entropy to meet password requirements. \u00a0Using this function:<\/p>\n

\"Password<\/p>\n

Where E is password entropy, R is the total number of available characters, and L is length.<\/p>\n

This equates to:<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
Passwords consisting of all lower case letters<\/td>\nAt least 17 characters long<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Passwords consisting of lower case and upper case letters<\/td>\nAt least 13 characters long<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Passwords consisting of lower case letters and at least one number<\/td>\nAt least 14 characters long\u00a0<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Passwords consisting of lower case, upper case letters and at least one number<\/td>\nAt least 12 characters long<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Passwords consisting of lower case, upper case letters, at least one number, and at least one symbol\u00a0<\/td>\nAt least 11 characters long<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

\"Brute<\/p>\n

PASSWORD STORAGE GUIDELINES<\/span><\/h2>\n

Video:\u00a0Using Password Managers to Stay Safe Online<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n


\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Secure Passwords PASSWORD CREATION GUIDELINES Passwords are challenging these days. \u00a0It is critically important to make a password secure, but sometimes that also makes it hard to remember. \u00a0We used to believe that to make a password more secure you would add more characters or change some letters to numbers and using a combination of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-1893","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.washk12.org\/tech\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1893","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.washk12.org\/tech\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.washk12.org\/tech\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.washk12.org\/tech\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.washk12.org\/tech\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1893"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.washk12.org\/tech\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1893\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1897,"href":"https:\/\/www.washk12.org\/tech\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1893\/revisions\/1897"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.washk12.org\/tech\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1893"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}