Change your Password day 2023

Do you use one of the ten most common passwords?
Then it is wise to change your password as soon as possible. Especially if you use the password for multiple accounts.

1. Welcome
2. Welcome01
3. Password
4. Password
5. 1234
6. 12345
7. 123456
8. 12345678
9. 123456789
10. Qwerty

Tips for creating a strong password

The longer the password, the stronger

Use a password that is hard to guess

It is important to choose a password that is difficult to guess. When creating a password, keep the following in mind:

• Make sure it is at least 8 characters long
• Include alphanumeric characters (such as a-z, A-Z, 0-9) or special characters (such as ~ ! @ # $ % ^ & ?)
• Make sure it contains at least 1 digit, 1 uppercase letter and 1 lowercase letter
• Don't make it too simple/systematic (like 123, abc or ABC)
• Don't use your own username, last name and ANR
• Make sure not to include information that can be traced back to you as a person, such as a date of birth and names of your children or pets

Choose a passphrase

Use a saying, phrase from a song or any other phrase that you can remember well. But do something extra with it, such as setting the first letters of each word from the song or phrase as your password. Also alternate with capital letters and the use of punctuation.

Use a unique password for each account

Internet criminals often try out a stolen password on as many different Internet services as possible. This is because the website where you have your account can also be hacked. If criminals get their hands on one of your passwords, they won't have immediate access to all of your accounts.

Use multi-factor authentication whenever possible

Here, in addition to your password, you need a second means of identification, such as a text message or a phone app (for example, Microsoft Authenticator) that generates a code. Tilburg University already requires MFA when using various applications.

Read more about multi-factor authentication

Use a password manager

Using a different password everywhere in the form of a sentence, with numbers and preferably punctuation, takes a lot out of your memory. And that can be tricky, because how do you remember all those passwords?
A good solution is to use a password manager. This is a kind of digital vault in which all the passwords you have with different websites are kept safe. All you have to remember is one master password. 
It can also come up with and store complicated passwords by itself. In addition, the password manager monitors for you if your passwords are not floating around somewhere online, such as on the dark web. This functionality is called Breach Watch. If your passwords are detected, you get an alert and have a new password created easily.

Keeper

Tilburg University has a campus license for the password manager Keeper. You can use this for free.

More information about Keeper, for example how to install and how to use Keeper, can be found on the Self Service Portal: Getting started with Keeper - Self-Service Portal (uvt.nl)

Change your passwords at least once every six months

If you do not use a password manager and the included Breach Watch function, then it is wise to change your password at least once every six months. 
Tilburg University also requires you to change your password for your Tilburg University account at least once every six months.

Did you know...

• 3 in 5 people in the Netherlands use the same password for multiple online services?
• Almost 2 in 5 people in the Netherlands use a total of 1 to 4 passwords on the internet?
• 1 in 2 of the people in the Netherlands sometimes worry about being hacked?
• Only 7% use a password manager?
• 56% of the people in the Netherlands are not familiar with a password manager?
• 70% of the people in the Netherlands indicate that they are unable to come up with a separate password for each online account?
• In 80% of cases, hackers gain access through password misuse?