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My mom's old password list woke me up to my own bad habits
I was cleaning out my parents' house last month and found a notebook my mom kept with all her passwords written down, labeled by website. I laughed at first, thinking how unsafe that was. Then I checked my own password manager and realized I'd been using the same 4 passwords for everything for like 6 years. What tipped me off was when I tried to log into my bank and my work account, and they both used the same root password with just a different number at the end. That notebook moment made me see I wasn't any better than her. I spent a whole Saturday resetting 50+ accounts with unique passwords and 2FA. Has anyone else had that wake up call where you realize your "system" is just as bad as the old school methods?
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miles9461mo ago
Hang on, your husband uses the same password from COLLEGE and just adds a number? That's wild. I mean, I get it, people get lazy, but college was like 15 years ago for most of us. That password has probably been in a breach a dozen times by now. The bank one really got me though. Number at the end or not, that's still the same root password for banking and work. That's basically asking for trouble. At least the notebook method is offline and sitting in a drawer somewhere, not floating around on the dark web.
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lindamartin1mo ago
It made me realize how many of us think we're being clever with our little shortcuts, but really we're just trading one kind of risk for another. My husband still uses the same password he made in college for everything, just adds a number when a site forces him to change it. We laugh at our parents for writing things down, but then we do stuff like using the same pin for our debit card as our phone unlock code. It's like we all have this blind spot where we think our method is better just because it's digital. That notebook probably kept her safer than half the people who think they're too smart for paper.
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