Gramma’s Off Her Rocker

You may have been wondering how I was able to so easily figure out the password that Greg used to secure that all important PREPPERS file on his computer: H4m@l1rch32ndS@c78

We’ve all been told, over and over, that strong passwords are a must for our technology-filled lives. If you’re like me, remembering these passwords that resemble someone swearing in Donald Duck language can be close to impossible, especially if you have more than one you need to remember.

Pet names, family birthdays or any other letter number combination that is easy to remember are obviously out, so how was I able to figure out Greg’s password for that mysterious file on his computer in so little time.

Use words and numbers that are easily remembered BY YOU

Greg’s hint that I used to figure out the password was Homeland Sec 18 A, and the only other paper connected to the PREPPERS file on the computer was the small note I found in a file folder labeled PREPPERS on Greg’s desk. To me it was clear. Greg had created an 18 digit password by combining the base phrase ‘HomelandSec’ with words and numbers that he would have no trouble remembering. The words in this case were our children’s names and the last two digits of their birth year ,

That meant that the first step to creating the password for the PREPPERS file was to take our oldest son’s first name, Archie, and insert it into the HomelandSec phrase creating a series of letters that looked like this: HomelarchiendSec. In order to avoid duplicate letters, the ‘a’ in Homeland, would also be the ‘a’, for Archie.

So where do the numbers come from? Step two in the process is replacing vowels with their corresponding numbers. Using the tried and true memory aide for remembering vowels: A, E, I, O, U and numbering them means that A=1, E=2, I=3, O=4, and U=5. This turns the original password that Greg made into: H4m2l1rch32ndS2c. Since it is best for any strong password not to have repeating letters/numbers, obviously something has to be done about all those 2s showing up in this verson of the password. Changing two of the number 2s to their special character equivalent ‘@’, turns the password into H4m@l1rch32ndS@c.

Where does the 78 at the end of his special password come from? Archie’s birth year, 1978. This makes the password 18 digits and disguises (at least a little bit) that vowels have been exchanged for numbers. Once I knew the base phrase, what child’s name was being used, and how many digits in total I needed for the password, getting into the file was easy!

Rock On!

Lissa Knowles