Chances are that the password was your spouse's name, your child's name orthat of a much-loved pet. Chances are that password could be cracked inabout one second flat. Chances are you use the same password to access allyour other online accounts, including your bank, your medical records, etc. A Primer Chances are you don't like the way this is going. I don't wantto alarm you, but passwords are at the heart of computer security and theyare the weakest link.
Most people use passwords they can easily remember.
Now, with small programs you candownload from the Internet, cracking a password is child's play. Opening a Microsoft document, for example, is relatively easy. A file from its main rival, IntuitInc.'s Quicken, can be opened by constructing a fake password. Improvedmeasures in Microsoft Office, according to LastBit Software's VitasRamanchauskas, make it harder to crack longer passwords but his softwarestill guarantees eventual success. Here is the problem.