Think your Google Gmail is safe? Think again!

Yet another flaw in Gmail was recently revealed by security researcher Vicente Aguilera Díaz, who has found previous flaws in Gmail. He found a back door allowing bad guys to repeatedly guess Gmail passwords.

According to his new alert, Google lets anyone with a Gmail account guess another Gmail user’s password 100 times every two hours, or 1,200 times per day.

No “captcha” keeps hackers from guessing passwords and, worst of all, this is per account so if a hacker controls 10 Gmail accounts that’s 12,000 guesses a day, 100 accounts, 120,000 guesses a day, etc.

Gmail accounts cost nothing and it would be easy for a hacker to control a lot more than 100 accounts, I’m sure most control tens of thousands of accounts, if not more.

Then, with a simple software program, a password cracker bot, it would be very easy to “harvest” the password from thousands of Gmail accounts, giving the person complete control over your account and access to all your personal mail and information.

While Google requires the bare minimum for a secure password, 8 characters, they put no other security measures and you could create extremely weak passwords list “aaaaaaaa” or “password”; a lot of people actually do use those.

Fortunately, there is a simple way for you to protect yourself from this problem.

The solution is using a secure password that is easy for you to remember but hard for someone to guess; I’ll show you how I do it.

I did a quick survey of friends and family and found only two people using a truly a secure password, my wife and my mother (and that is because I’ve forced them to do it

They were using the standard “hackers love it” passwords like their pets name, children’s names, grandchildren’s names, birthday, simple words (like password or one used applepie).

Understand, those types of passwords could be guessed, on average, within about 10,000 guesses.

And since most people use only a few passwords for ALL their accounts, once someone knows your Gmail password they have access to a lot of other things; which they can learn about from your e-mail they can access and those place probably shows them other things to access and on and on.

And if you use the same password for Gmail as say, PayPal, well, I don’t think I need to go on.

Create Easy to Remember Passwords

Why are these passwords created?

Because they are easy to remember.

Lucky you and lucky hackers.

It’s actually easy to create a password you can remember that is very hard to guess or crack.

What is a Strong Password?

A really strong password should “look like” a random string of characters. It should be 14 characters or longer and it should include at least one uppercase and lowercase letters, numbers, and special characters (special characters are the other characters like !@#$%^&*()~’_-+={[}]|\:;<>?/”.

Sounds daunting but read on.

First, that rule is if you want a really strong password which you probably only need for your bank accounts, etc.

Second, for a strong, but not rock solid, password you can ease the rules slightly, and many places don’t even let you use special characters in passwords.

Third, there is a simple trick to creating passwords you’ll be able to remember and still follow those rules.

So for a reasonably strong password we always want all these things:

1. Uppercase letters
2. Lowercase letters
3. Numbers
4. At least 8 characters
5. Not a real word that would be in a dictionary (hackers use digital dictionaries to guess passwords)
6. Not anything that is specifically related to you, at least that would be “public knowledge”
7. It’s also best not to use any letter or number more than once (uppercase and lowercase of the same letter count as two different letters)
8. Add special characters when possible

As I said, it’s easy to do this even if it sounds hard.

Creating a Strong Password

The key to creating a strong password you can remember but would be difficult to guess is to use a trigger phrase.

By that I mean something that few people know but that you remember very well. Here are some examples:

• I married Linda in 2003 on a cruise
• I started Karate in El Paso with Master Yamagito in August 1975
• The best night of bowling ever was at the Frontier Lanes with Joe

So the first step in a strong password i to find your own trigger phrase. It should be something easy for you to remember but something few people will know.

Now just take one letter from each word. Most people find it easier to just use the first letter which is fine although taking an interior letter is better.

Taking the first letter from the first trigger phrase above we have ImLi03oac.

Personally, I find using the last 2 numbers of a year to be easier to remember than the first number, and it gives more variety, so doing that and removing “duplicates” .

ImLi03oac, not likely someone will guess that!

It you wanted, you count stop there because you’ve satisfied the requirements but for your really secure passwords you should add some special characters; if your bank or other account doesn’t allow them then you should use a longer trigger phrase.

If you want to make it stronger just add a few characters from the site name you are entering the password for.

If the above password was for your PayPal account then just make it “payImLi03oac”

That’s really all there is to it.

For a few days it may be a bit hard to remember but just say the trigger phrase in your head and soon your fingers will remember the password even if your brain doesn’t without saying the phrase.

This will make all your passwords very difficult to break and keep your accounts very secure.

By the way, Microsoft had a password checker, so after you create your password you can check how strong it is; go to http://www.microsoft.com/protect/yourself/password/checker.mspx

Keeping Your Passwords Safe

Now that you have strong passwords it would be foolish to write them down or keep them in an unsecure document on your computer. Here are some things to do to help your guard your passwords and your accounts.

Don’t use the same password for all accounts

Even with a strong password if you use it for all your accounts then if it is cracked you are completely vulnerable.

If you have a lot of accounts then it might become hard to have enough trigger phrases and to remember which phrase went with which account but you can do one of two things.

First, you can create account buckets.

By that I mean create 3-5 different passwords and use those for all your accounts, essentially putting each account into one of the account buckets that has a password associated with it.

Sometimes you may not remember what a password is but you only have a limited number of choices, all secure, to try; this balances convenience and security.

Secondly, read the next section!

Use Password Managers

There are programs that will help you manager you passwords and keep them secure.

The primary advantage in this case is you can create as many very secure passwords as you want and the software will keep track of them and, the best software, automatically fills out the information for you.

The most popular of these, at least with Internet Marketers is RoboForm.

It lets you securely save user names, passwords, addresses and even credit card numbers and will insert them into the right place on each Web site.

The primary negative is that it is completely Web focused so it can’t help you with your other passwords (like I password protect certain Word document and Excel spreadsheets).

A nice benefit is that there is a version called RoboForm2Go that lets you run it from a USB “stick” or “drive” so you can take it and use it anywhere. It doesn’t leave any trace of your passwords on the other computers.

There is a free version but it is somewhat limited so I’d recommend the $30 paid Pro version. Go here to download it.

Change Passwords Periodically

Yes, unfortunately, changing passwords is a great way to thwart hackers even if they do get your passwords.

Change them about every 6 months and most of the Password Managers can also remind you when it is time to change your password.

Beware of Wireless Access

If you travel or just access you accounts from Starbucks unless the site uses secure communications, that is it starts with https:// instead of just http://, then don’t type in your user name and password. It would be quite easy for a hacker to get what you typed in.

Conclusion

Google’s Gmail has some significant flaws that will let people steal your password.

Using strong passwords will protect you from this and other similar flaws in Web sites and software, making your accounts and information much better protected.

Creating and remembering strong passwords isn’t that hard just use a trigger phrase and build your password from it.

Just remember that password should be as long as possible but no shorter than 8 characters, always contain letters (both uppercase and lowercase) and numbers and, when possible special characters.

Protect your strong password by:

• Not using the same password for all accounts
• Using password managers
• Changing passwords periodically
• Being cautious of wireless access

The importance of this can’t be overemphasized because of the danger of identity theft and financial ruin.

Make strong passwords even though it can be a slight inconvenience at first.

I added an audios page where I will be putting the cool audios from the TGI sunday night calls. We have been talking the last 2 Sundays about Branding, go figure. Come join us on Sundays at 7:30 PM CDT at 218-486-7200  PIN 413673.

We have also added a page called ‘Get Out There’!  This page gives you some new ideas on advertising and indexing your web page and blog.

Also, we just released our first Press Release. So easy to do with Free Press Release .  Here is a link to our First MBU Press Release . I was SOOOOO Easy. It cost me a whole $1.00 to expedite the indexing on Google!

The answer is Brand yourself, not your primary company.

See the information at http://www.MyBrandUniversity.com and sign up for the FREE 10 reports to help your understand why Branding YOU really helps.

Instead of writing texts, some bloggers choose to make their blogs more audio friendly, by using spoken word entries. This is called audio blogging.

Basically a blog contains these features:

title- which allows you to label your post
body- this is the content of your post
trackback- other sites can be linked back to your blog
permanent link- every article that you write has a URL
comments- this allow readers to post comments on your blog.

One of the advantages of blogging, is that it is made of only a few templates. Unlike, other websites that is made up of numerous individual pages. This make it easier for blog users to create new pages, because it already has a fix setting that include: slots for title, body of the post, category, etc.

This is especially useful for first time users, since they can start blogging right away. They can chose from a  number of templates that blogging websites provide.

Anyone who wants to start a blog can do so by becoming a member of a blogging website of their choice. Once they’ve become members, they automatically become a part of that particular blogging community. They can browse through other bloggers pages, and link them back to their own blogs. They can also make comments on other members’ blogs.

Blogging is not just limited to personal usage. There are a lot of blogs that follow a theme such as: sports, politics, philosophy, social commentary, etc. These blogs espouse on their specific themes. This way blogging becomes a medium in which people can share their knowledge and opinions about a variety of themes and topics.

Some bloggers even use their blogs as a means to advertise. Some authors advertise their books on their blogs. While other bloggers, use their blogs to shed light to currents issues, events, news and catastrophes.

Nowadays in education, blogs also play an important part. Professors use blogging to document the lessons that they have discussed and taught. This way, students who who have missed classes, can easily catch up with their assignments.

A lot of entrepreneurs benefit from blogging by promoting their businesses on their blogs, with millions and millions of people logging onto the net everyday, blogging has become a lucrative move. Some bloggers who run online businesses promote their merchandise online. While others profit through advertisement.

But by far, the most popular blog type is the one that takes the form of a personal journal. This is the kind that is usually used by first time bloggers. Individuals who want to document the daily struggle of their everyday lives, poems, rants, opinions, find that blogging offers them a medium in which to express themselves.

Bloggers usually communicate within themselves. This is one of the appeals of blogging. It creates a community of people sharing their ideas, thoughts, and comments with each other.

Blogs varying in topics, themes, and set-ups, can be found in blog directories. First time users who want to get an idea of what the blogging world is all about can browse through a number of blogs using these directories. This way they’d get an idea of what these blogging communities are like.

Blogging is popular all over the world. Blog is short for the term weblog. There are no rules when it comes to blogging. Bloggers have the freedom to express themselves how ever way they want, and the best thing about blogging, is that most blogging sites are free.

There are numerous blogging websites to choose from in the net. This give first time users the option of joining a blogging community that appeals to their interests.

Just search any blogging directory and you’d get a listing of a lot of blogging sites that are available on the net. It’s easy to search a blogging directory, because it is organized according to category. This way you would get exactly what you are after. Blogging is really for everyone. It is fun, simple and easy.

The best way a business can use blogging to boost their business is by taking part in the blogs of others. You can easily create quality posts with your business in mind without needing to set up a blog of your own. Try finding blogs that pertain to the area of business you are in. This will help you get started. With millions of blogs out there, you should be able to find some with no problem. Choose to post on all of them, or choose the few that get the most activity. Then begin posting. When you do, you will see positive results come in. If you are still curious about how this can boost your business, check out these three reasons blogging boosts business.

Quick Name Recognition

The fastest way to get your business’s name out in the public is to make it known to your targeted marketing group. If you want to get your company’s name out to men who like fishing, then you can find a blog that is about just that. When you find the blogs pertaining to this marketing group, post useful and intelligent information about topics that pertain to your company. You might not want to sound like an advertisement. Think about responding to another comment and simply tagging your signature with your company’s website. This is a subtle way to get their attention. The more you post on blogs, the more widely known your company’s name will become with the select marketing group. When they tell their friends and family about the site then your consumer group will have grown even more. This is a fast way to get started. You will have to invest some time however. At least an hour a day can be used for this type of task.

Consumer Testimonies

Your company might even think about hiring professionals to blog for your company. You can offer these employees products to try and give them the task of finding blogs where they can appropriately “praise” the product. By paying these people to do the task, you will be getting the work done that you need without having to devote much time. Consumer testimonials go a long way with other consumers. If these bloggers are productive enough, you will see an increase due to it.

Building Relationships

Smart business owners know that they can go further with the help of others. A great way to connect and build relationships with other businesses is via their blog. If you are a regular poster who values their business, they will be more likely to work with you. Working together with advertising is a great idea. You can swap ad space for no fee if you like. These are great things for business owners and are easy to get into when you blog regularly.

As you can see, blogging can be a great way to do business. It may seem like tricky advertising, and it is in some ways. However, it is free advertising that does the same thing as a commercial on television does. It reaches a targeted marketing group and lets them know your company’s name, products, and sometimes offers an endorsement. Overall, it is an effective way to get your business out there. When people have no idea who you are, they are not going to feel comfortable working with you. The better your reputation is, the more likely they will trust you. When you have no reputation at all, they will not trust you either. So, even if you just want to use blogging to build your company’s reputation, it will be worth your while. Give it a try and see what type of results you can get using these tips.