How do I choose a good password?

Creating a good password can be a difficult task.  Passwords should be easy to remember but hard to guess.  If you must write down your password, remember to keep it as secure as your credit card number.  Here's some advice on how to make and remember a good password:

• Do not use common words associated with your place or type of employment.

• Substituting numbers or special characters for letters when creating acronyms is a good way to make a password easy to remember. Here are some examples for strong passwords (do not use these examples yourself):
  

  Be kind to nerds	would become	Bk1nd2:N3rds
  Love to use Banner!	would become	Lv2Banr!
  Tastes great − less filling	would become	Tstgr8-lesfill
  I hate passwords	would become	Ih8pswdS?

Password Requirements

Starting August 14, 2006, faculty and staff will be required to use strong passwords for logging into Banner accounts, domain accounts, e-mail accounts and desktop computers this fall. The password requirements are as follows:

Banner, domain and email passwords:

• The first character of your password must be alphabetic
• Your password must be a mix of upper and lower case letters
• Your password must contain AT LEAST one number
• Your password must be AT LEAST eight characters long
• Your password must contain AT LEAST one special character (from the following list): ! % * + - / ? :
• Your password MAY NOT be longer than fifteen characters total

The Vault

Passwords are a security measure to keep others from using your account.  If someone else uses your account, any of the following things could happen. An intruder can:

• use your class account to submit false assignments in your name.
• steal, modify or destroy information you keep on a shared computer.
• send slanderous, defamatory or otherwise embarrassing e-mail from your account under your name.
• use your account later without your knowledge or password.
• store material on your account that would implicate you in illegal or unethical acts such as software piracy or prohibited electronic game-playing.

The privacy of your electronic mail is also at stake.  If you give your password to someone else who uses your account for anything unethical or illegal, such as sending harassing e-mail or hacking into systems, you will be held responsible .  That's why you should never share your account.