Lafayette CollegeTechnology Help
It is Information Technology Services (ITS) policy that passwords used to access computing systems at Lafayette be strong. ITS strongly encourages the use of strong passwords for all other computing systems.
A strong password is one that is more secure by virtue of being difficult for a machine or a human to guess. Password strength can be achieved by incorporating the following characteristics; the more characteristics you incorporate into your password, the stronger it will be.
A strong password is hard to guess, but it should be easy for you to remember—a password that has to be written down is not strong, no matter how many of the above characteristics are employed.
While all systems that use the Lafayette NetID and password for authentication support a password with the above characteristics, please note that other systems may not support similarly strong passwords. For example, a system may not recognize case, may have a limit on the number of characters, or may not allow special characters. ITS recommends that, in these situations, users incorporate as many strong password characteristics as the system will allow.
Think of a word or phrase, then substitute letters for numbers and special characters. Mix the case of any remaining letters. For example:
Think of a word and a number, then intersperse them and mix the letter case. For example, the name of your elementary school (Main Street Elementary) and your pet’s birth month and year (12/96) becomes m1A2/i9n6