Tips to Protect Yourself and don't touch me

1. Password
Ever saw this : “You must remember your Password. We can’t retrieve it for you because it’s Encrypted with MD5 (or SHA1, etc) ”

Don’t believe that dude. Given to the processing speed of computers nowadays, cracking a MD5 password is not that hard though (Ex : Rainbow Table). But there’s way to protecting yourself though. Read tips below :

Password complexity and length is the key to protect yourself. A good password must have combination of letter (ucase and lcase), number, symbol, space and ASCII (like ∟╞ªæ) if allowed.

Look at this two password, which one is harder to crack?

handsome zoiz
hªnd5☺m3 zoiz ?|>!

And never use a single password for multiple accounts. (Note to someone who’s owned totally a couple days ago :P).

Now maybe you are safer with your password, but there are so many things you need to do to protect yourself.

2. Security Question
Security Question on some service is really great when dealing with forgotten password. Like Yahoo, Hotmail, and Friendster, and other service, they all use Security Question to help user reseting or retrieving a forgotten password. But, although it’s a great service, also a vital threat. Here is a short story to explain that :

Let’s say Th0R is the hacker and Jo is the victim. (So where is Jac?? No, Jac is not in this story :P). One day, when Th0R wants to own Jo, because Jo steal Th0R’s favorite ice cream. And so he (Th0R) goes to Jo’s Friendster profile and take a deep look at it. He founds out that Jo loves Ayumi Hamasaki so much, because all Jo’s favorite are related to Ayumi Hamasaki. In some way, Th0R know when is Jo’s birthday from Jo’s Friendster. And now, Th0R is going to try his luck to own Jo’s yahoo mail account. First, Th0R click on the forgot password link on Yahoo! Mail and he types in the email, let’s say jo_ganteng@yahoo.com. And Th0R is prompted to enter Jo’s Birthday (which can be found on Jo’s Friendster), Jo’s Location (which also can be found on Jo’s Friendster), and the most important one : Secret Question. The secret question is : What is your favorite Song? Th0R thinks for a while, and he remember that Jo’s favorite artist is Ayumi Hamasaki. Nah, then he first enter “Dearest”. Ops, Yahoo! says wrong answer. Then he tries “Endless Sorrow”. Ups, wrong again. Then he type again “Depend On You”. Wow, incredible. Correct answer!! Now he can change Jo’s Yahoo! mail password.

And then Th0R login to Jo’s Yahoo! Mail, and see there are also Paypal password in his inbox, and other important information of Jo’s is saved in his Yahoo! Mail. Now, Jo is owned!!

End of story :) After reading that, have you realized something? Is it save for you to put real information on any online social community? Don’t be sad, cheers :)

And the tips for this story is : Never enter correct answers for Secret Question. You can enter “Kentucky Fried Chicken” for secret question : “What is your childhood hero?”. The point is just make it impossible to guess. Now you understand why I said Secret Question may become a threat, rite?

Above are some important tips that you need to be aware! Remember to say thanks (in the comment) if you find this article useful.

by :Zoiz@hackingforte