password

Some routers require passwords in a particular format. Users may find that after entering a password for a WEP Internet connection, their AirPort menu bar icon shows an exclamation mark. You may also see an alert that reads, "Alert: No Internet connection..."

These routers actually have open networks that your Mac will associate with, but they still require a correctly formatted password to connect to the Internet. If the password is not interpreted correctly, the exclamation mark will appear and you will be unable to access content online.

To remedy the situation, you need to adjust the format … Read more

Password management has long been one of the most crucial and most complicated tricks to safely and securely pull off. The browser add-on LastPass simplifies it all in a cross-platform tool that's a must-use--as long as you don't mind that it's all in the cloud.

There are several installation options for LastPass. Windows users can run the LastPass universal installer to get the add-on for Firefox, Chrome, and Internet Explorer simultaneously. An extension is available for Opera 11 beta users, but those on Opera 10 will have to settle for the LastPass bookmarklet until the browser's … Read more

The bottom line: Effective, secure, and easy to use, LastPass offers a broad base of password-management features for free that can be expanded when upgrading to the premium version. It's an essential add-on for modern Web browsing.

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Passwords have gotten so complicated that even people with ferociously sharp memories can struggle to recall the eccentric combinations of letters, numbers, and symbols. There are passwords for personal e-mail, work e-mail, bank accounts, Twitter, and Facebook, and woe to anybody who uses the same one for those two malware magnets. On top of that, it's recommended that you regularly … Read more

With a new survey finding that half of the people polled plan to shop online for the holidays, security company Webroot offers some tips and tricks for staying safe in cyberspace.

Among the more than 2,660 consumers surveyed in the U.S., the U.K., and Australia by Webroot, 55 percent said they do plan to buy at least half of their holiday gifts online, a rise from 38 percent last year. But some of those people also plan to use search engines and public Wi-Fi to purchase those presents, activities that Webroot says could put buyers at risk.… Read more

A 23-year-old California man is in jail accused of breaking into more than 170 e-mail accounts of women and stealing explicit photos of them, as well as sending the photos to their e-mail contacts and posting them on their Facebook pages.

George Samuel Bronk, an unemployed 23-year-old from Citrus Heights, Calif., is believed to have targeted the victims by cruising women's Facebook pages and using information gleaned off the social network to trick different Web-based e-mail accounts into allowing him to change passwords linked to the women's accounts, Sergeant Kelly Dixon of the California Highway Patrol's Computer … Read more

Facebook added several new security features today, including the ability for people to request a one-time password for use on public computers.

When using a computer on which you don't want to type in your regular password you can now request a one-time password by texting "otp" to 32665 from a mobile phone. You have to have already confirmed that the phone is yours on your Facebook account. The one-time password will expire after 20 minutes, the company said in a blog post.

Facebook is rolling the feature out gradually, and it should be available to everyone … Read more

Password Corral from Cygnus Productions is a free password-management tool that can help you remember and recover your passwords and protect them with strong encryption. You can add descriptions or comments that help you remember or organize your passwords as well as track their expiration date. You can set Password Corral to time out to the Windows system tray after a period of inactivity and prevent it from reactivating without your master password, which keeps your passwords protected even if you accidentally leave the program open. It can export and back up your password data in encrypted or unencrypted form, … Read more

Anyone who uses the Web for a while knows that login information starts to pile up quickly. With online e-mail accounts, login information for online banking, and countless forums, most users start to use the same passwords for everything. It's pretty easy to see how this is a bad security practice.

Fortunately, you can download 1Password, which remembers all your passwords so you don't have to. Simply come up with a secure master password and then train 1Password to log in to sites for you. It integrates seamlessly with Apple's Mac OS X Keychain and generates complex … Read more

Passwords are perhaps the weakest links in the cyber-security chain; if they're complex enough to be secure, you probably won't be able to remember them. Add the fact that every other site seems to require a password, and it's easy to see why far too many people end up using one or two simple passwords that are easy to remember, and easy to crack, too. You can write your passwords down on a piece of paper that you can look for and fail to find when you need it, or you can download and install G&… Read more