Lately, I’ve become aware of some really sloppy and unsafe password practices that clients have.  I thought we were turning the corner a while back and unfortunately gang, I think it’s getting worse.  For some of you, I have set up professional password managers like Last Pass and 1Password.  These do a very good job of keeping your passwords secure and allowing you to create completely randomized passwords, if you take advantage of this feature.  However, where is your hard copy / print out of these passwords?   Next, some of you choose to use the password managers built into your browsers like Safari, Chrome or Firefox.   If you are syncing these with an Apple, Google or Firefox account – you have a backup.  But where is your printed copy?   Is it even possible to make a printed copy of those passwords?   Are you keeping one copy in duplicate on paper?   These are things you really need to think of, pronto.    Finally, there is an even larger group of you that just keep your passwords on paper.  I don’t have a problem with this necessarily.  But are they on scraps of paper that are scattered all over the place?  Are these passwords mixed in with all of your other notes and documents about your computer?  You can’t keep doing it the same way.  If you are going to go the paper route, these passwords should be in a notebook for passwords only. 

I really hope this scenario doesn’t apply to anyone, but I know that a couple clients keep their passwords in an unprotected Word or Excel document on their hard drives.  This is very unsafe.  I have become aware that Excel 2016 and later can ENCRYPT a spreadsheet at the file level, which is way better than saving it with a password as has been the case in Office apps for years.  This encryption option would be ok in my opinion.