I had to change a password on one of the many password protected sites we access what seems hourly! I didn’t have to change it because it was that time whether that time is every month, every 6 months, or any time like the site feels like messing with you. I didn’t have to change it because I forgot my password. I had to change it because I kept mis-typing it. I am the king of typos! I’m lucky I can get through an entire sentence when I can actually see the letters taking shape on the screen in front of me. Hid everything behind ******************** and it’s a crapshoot if I got +#^ or +@&. Even if I see them I may not be able to tell if I have it right. But that’s a story for later – later in this post.

When I entered the “select your password” phase of reestablishing my password, the site provided me with their rules. Oddly, not all sites do that. This site, in addition to the upper and lower case letters, numbers, and special characters (why do they call them special, aren’t they the same symbols that have appeared on keyboards since the time keyboards were attached to typewriters? Can’t we just call them “symbols” or is that too symbolic?), this set of rules featured – for the first time ever, live on our stage! (sorry I got carried away – this set of rules included the querulous instruction to not end with a number. Naturally I can’t take an instruction like that and not dig deeper so I dug deeper.

Yes, it appears somebody who studies these sorts of things has determined that passwords ending in numbers are more likely to be hacked. I think maybe it has to do with something about some people’s predilection to serializing their passwords so like maybe they don’t forget them. You may have done it, or perhaps are doing it yourself. OpenSesame1, OpenSesame2, OpenSesame3, etc.  I also discovered that once very popular, opensesame has fallen way down the list of people’s password choices. Now this brings up a couple of questions. First of all, if passwords are supposed to be such closely guarded secrets, often under penalty of on-line death if revealed, how does anyone know what once was and what is no longer popular. (Many of the same sources even noted people are still out there using “password” for their passwords. -Same question fellas!) The other question I have about opensesame is why didn’t I ever think about that? What a great password! And so versatile. The user who selects opensesame or one of its variants (perhaps OpenSesame1, OpenSesame2, OpenSesame3, etc) might be an Antoine Galland fan, a lover of the Three Stooges, or trapped in the seventies singing their way to internet access with Kool and the Gang. Opportunity lost.

Anyway, back to the point of this post (yes, yes, go ahead and smirk), I can live with the odd rules, making my passwords at least 8 characters and not more than 20, using upper and lower cases, tossing in a few numbers as long as one isn’t at the end, even the inclusion of “special characters,” but can I at least see what I’m typing? It appears that the two most common methods of breaking the password code are guessing and “entry intercept” whereby a program, bug, virus, or some malevolent genie captures the keystrokes made to enter the password characters (special and otherwise) and shares them with the head virus writer, bug-programmer, or Ali Baba. So, while we’re struggling with trying to accurately enter jkwp9y%Roa&&fmMqrs!! the virus may see what we’re typing, but all we see is   ********************.

Now I ask you, is that fair?