How to stay safe using Password management plugin (Episode 3)
Welcome back to the training ground. The war is ongoing and we need to get ready as fast as possible.
Password is probably the most abuse thing these days, according to a research carried out by google and polling firm Harris, fifty-two percent (52%) of people use one password from multiple platforms and thirteen percent (13%). I am sure some of us are among either of these groups. This means if one of your accounts is compromised either some or all may be compromised.
In the digital world almost every day we deal with passwords, you can almost do nothing without using a password. Ranging from social media, email, online learning, video/audio streaming, almost everything needs passwords, this password guy is just our friend, it doesn’t matter if we like him or not, because he is our gatekeeper. Now that we have established the fact that the password is our gatekeeper we will all agree that we can’t use one gatekeeper to protect several gates and our gatekeeper needs to be strong also. Therefore it is very important to have a unique password for every account and these passwords must not be easy to guess. But wait a minute, how on earth can we have strong unique passwords and remember them all, this may be difficult and almost impossible to remember them all.
Well, thank goodness there is a way out. The password manager is here to save the day.
NB an article has been dedicated to giving a detailed explanation on password manager so we won’t be doing that here visit www.cybersecurity.provarex.com/
So basically what a password manager does is to save all your passwords securely and help you fill them whenever you want to login to your account. This means you don’t need to remember your password every time you try to log in. That’s a good thing, isn’t it? I know you know and we all know that it is.
This great tool has a free and paid-for version. Examples of some of the best free password management plugin:
- LastPass
- KeePass
- Sticky Password
- Roboform
- Keeper
- TrueKey
- LogMeOnce
- Symantec Norton Identity safe
- Enpass Password Manager. And many more
Examples of some of the best paid-for password management plugin:
- LastPass
- Dashlane
- Keeper
- LogMeOnce
- NordPass
- 1Password
- Bitwarden
- RoboForm. And many more
Today we will pick install and configure one out of all. We are going to learn how to use the one that is both free and paid for, the most popular, very easy to use and, it is no other than, oh you guess right LastPass.
DOWNLOAD AND INSTALLING LASTPASS
LastPass is a great password manager when you install it, you will be given a 14days free enterprise trail which you may choose to pay for it or use the free version after it expires. It supports almost all popular web browsers, it also has a mobile device version for both android and iPhone.
NB: For this demo, we will be using Firefox
You can get this app simply by searching for it on your favourite search engine, click on the right link and you will see something like this :
Click on Add to Firefox. A pop up will appear just like this
Click Add. You are almost there. Another op up will show up just like this:
Come on LastPass we are tire of these pop-ups already, well don’t be tired soldiers we need to train in other to win this war. Just click on “OK” and your last pass will now ask for permission to have access to your system since we trust this software we will agree and move on. The agreement pop up will be like this:
Finally, we are done with the installation, now its time to set up our account. If you click on accept you will be redirected to a page where you will create an account and just like this:
If you input your email, you will be sent a verification email, then after you have done that, you will be asked to create a master password. Now this is where you really need to input a strong password, preferably let the password contain alphabets, numbers and special characters. You can make it as long as possible since it will be the only password you will have to remember. Most importantly don’t share this password with anyone, not even you wife or husband, not you boyfriend or girlfriend. No matter how you trust them don’t just share it. Don’t forget you are a soldier and that is not a suggestion, it is an order.
Now that we have LastPass up and running. We will have homework. This homework is simple, play with LastPass and understand it very well. If you choose to use another password manager, it is not an offence, just make sure you understand it and you are good to go.
Alright, folks, this is all we have for this week. don’t forget the comment section is available for you and your contribution is also of great importance. don’t be shy to ask and answer questions lets discuss.
See you next week with another exciting and educative articles.