October is Cybersecurity Awareness Month. In recognition of this, ITS would like to encourage everyone to think about a plan for managing their online identities. Every day we log into websites that save our personal information, financial records and shopping orders. One thing all these sites have in common is that they require us to create a username and password to access our accounts. Each one is different and sometimes difficult to remember. Using a common username and password is the easiest to remember but is actually the least secure. If one account credential is compromised, they are, in effect, all compromised with this practice. Unfortunately, there is no perfect answer or easy solution to this dilemma. Using common sense with your data is the best advice we can give you. Use strong passwords on sites that contain extremely critical types of data such as banking and consider using pass phrases that are easier to remember. Don’t sign up or enter sensitive data unless it is necessary.
When it comes to your Canisius account, we request that you do not use the same password on other sites where you use your Canisius email address as the account name. For example, Facebook uses an email address as the user name. If you use your Canisius email address, be sure to use a different password to log into your Facebook account. We highly recommend keeping your social media and online shopping accounts separate from your work-related accounts. It seems that these types of accounts are the most likely targets for hackers.
We have created a wiki page on creating passwords that users should review next time they need to change their password. Click the link below to visit this page.
Submitted by: Scott Clark, director, User Services/ITS
