5 Password Hygiene Tricks to Assist Preserve Your Patreon Account Secure

Think about you’re making an attempt to log in to your favourite web site. You enter your e-mail deal with and your typical password. However whenever you click on login, nothing occurs, apart from that pesky error message we’ve all seen a thousand instances: “Your Password Is Incorrect.”

You panic, rack your mind, and take a look at your second (and third) most-used password, praying that you just received’t get locked out of the location. Lastly, you attain out to help, who provides you some shocking information — somebody has modified your password and is utilizing your account.

You’ve been the sufferer of an account takeover.

Now this may very well be a small inconvenience, or relying on what account has been accessed, it may very well be big and expensive. As an example, in case you are a patron and somebody had been to take over your Patreon account, they might rip-off you through the use of your fee methodology to pay right into a pretend Patreon web page that they personal. Or in case you’re a creator, they might take over your account and steal your steadiness (or worse).

Fairly scary, proper?

Account takeovers aren’t something new, however basically, they appear to be occurring way more continuously lately. In line with KPMG, account takeovers have gone up 57 % within the UK in the course of the first half of 2019. And, in 2019 alone, there have been 1000’s of breaches and billions of items of data stolen from establishments as large because the Dow Jones to Dunkin’ Donuts.

5 Password Hygiene Tricks to Preserve Your Patreon Account Secure and Safe

To ensure that your Patreon account data stays secure and out of the fingers of dangerous actors, we put collectively an inventory of issues you are able to do to guard your login data.

1. Don’t Use Your Patreon Password Anyplace Else.

We’ve all performed it earlier than. An internet site tells you to create a brand new password, and as an alternative of inventing a brand new one, you simply reuse a password you’ve used elsewhere.

Is that this simpler within the brief run? Sure, after all it’s. However it’s not a good suggestion. And right here’s why: in case your e-mail and password are a part of a breach someplace, that might suck. However, it could suck much more in case you had used that password some place else, too. Then, the fraudulent particular person wouldn’t simply have entry to considered one of your accounts — they’d have entry to each account that you just used that password with.

So subsequent time you end up whipping out that very same ol’ password, strive mixing it up and utilizing a unique one. Your future self might be completely satisfied that you just did.

2. Use a Lengthy, Difficult Password.

Higher but, use a password generator, which may generate lengthy strings of alphanumeric passwords for you. Additionally, don’t use your identify or your birthday in your password — these are simple to determine. Keep in mind, the extra random the letters and numbers are, the higher, which brings us to quantity 3…

3. Password Managers Are Invaluable.

Lengthy, difficult, nonsensical passwords are good for stopping dangerous guys, however they certain aren’t simple to recollect.

With a password supervisor, you’ll be capable of get tremendous difficult together with your passwords with out operating the danger of getting locked out of your accounts. Plus, they typically embody a password generator as a part of their setup, so you possibly can immediately create a password that’s kooky sufficient to guard your accounts. Password managers are very secure and just about impenetrable, and we suggest utilizing one together with your Patreon account.

4. By no means Share Your Patreon Password with Different Folks.

I understand how tempting it may be to only give somebody, possibly a pal or a relative, your Patreon password, to allow them to handle a job for you. However don’t do it! Not solely do you not know the place that password will find yourself, you additionally don’t know what machine that password might be used on.

For instance, say you give your password to your aunt since you want some assist messaging your patrons. She then tries to connect with your Patreon account utilizing a public laptop. The one drawback is, that laptop had been contaminated by a keystroke logging malware, which permits a hacker to document her typing (and your password). Then, to make issues worse, she forgets to log off of the general public laptop when she’s performed, leaving your Patreon account open to the lots. Meep.

You by no means know the place that password could find yourself, so higher to be secure than sorry. Preserve your password to your self, and in addition…

5. Use 2 Issue or a Time-Based mostly One-Time Password (TOTP) With Your Patreon Account.

The most effective rule of thumb is to protect your passwords like treasure. And, so far as passwords are involved, 2 Issue authentication (2FA) and TOTP are the equivalents of a dynamite proof secure.

We’ve written about 2FA and TOTP extensively, however right here’s a recap simply in case: 2FA implies that you want two components to log in to your account. One kind of 2FA that you should utilize with Patreon is SMS based mostly. As an example, in case you have 2FA SMS enabled on Patreon, each time you log in to your account, additionally, you will obtain a textual content from us making certain that it’s truly you.

Whereas this can be a lot safer than only one password, utilizing TOTP as your second issue is even safer.

Right here’s a quote from our weblog on why TOTP rocks:

“Like SMS, TOTP provides a second issue to the Patreon login course of. Nevertheless, as an alternative of doing so with a six-digit static code texted to your cellphone, TOTP two-factor authentication makes use of a separate app that’s continuously producing short-lived codes. There are lots of apps that present two-factor TOTP similar to Google Authenticator, which is free to make use of, and others like Duo or 1Password, which each cost a month-to-month charge. The truth that these apps generate codes which are at all times altering, and that aren’t dependent in your cellphone quantity, limits the possibility of an attacker getting a maintain of a sound code (your second issue), and thus, your account.”

If that feels like gobbledygook to you, take a look at our help article on enabling 2FA to make doubly certain your Patreon account is safe.

Congratulations on leveling Up Your Password Sport

Account takeovers are terrifying. However they’re additionally avoidable. By following the recommendation on this article, you’re not solely protecting your account data secure — you’re protecting your patrons data secure, too.

In the event you like what you’ve learn, and also you need to be taught extra on related matters, subscribe to our Belief and Security e-mail sequence under and take a look at the remainder of the Belief and Security Weblog Sequence.