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Microsoft Minimum Password Length

What is Wireless Data Security?

However, not all Internet traffic is unimportant. With the rise of broadband technology, more daily business takes place online, which makes the risk of data theft greater than ever. Luckily, there are ways to protect yourself and your data from the unsavory characters who call the Internet home.

What is encryption?

The industry standard for secure Internet transmissions is 128-bit encryption. It encodes messages by using a linked key method. On one end, the message is encoded with a private key. The recipient uses the sender's public key to decode the message after it arrives. If the message was tampered with in any way, the public key doesn't decode the message correctly -- alerting the recipient that the information shouldn't be trusted.

Verifying that messages are intact when they arrive is all well and good, but what about confidential messages that shouldn't be read by anyone but the intended recipient? Say you need to send confidential plans for your newest product line to your marketing manager. You would encode the documents by using the recipient's public key, ensuring that only his or her private key could decode the information. Anyone else who tried would get a mess of random characters.

Does your Web browser support 128-bit encryption?

To check your Web browser's level of encryption, open the About dialog box. In Microsoft® Windows® Internet Explorer, select Help > About Internet Explorer. The Cipher Strength field indicates your encryption level.

Use Antivirus and Antispyware Software

Installing a firewall on your PC is vitally important to security, but unfortunately, just blocking the entrance to your system isn't enough to keep it secure. You also need to have virus-scanning and spyware-detection software installed and running.

Antivirus Methods

These packages need to be updated regularly to remain effective because malicious hackers don't write one virus and then go home. They write one, and then watch to see what virus-scanning software vendors do to detect it. Hackers learn how to make their viruses less detectable and more virulent -- and every time new viruses are released, virus software gets smarter about detecting them. It's a cat-and-mouse game that catches computer users in the middle. The best steps to take to avoid infection are:

• Practice caution when using the Internet -- don't visit questionable Web sites, don't click on pop-up ads, and don't click links haphazardly.
• Update your virus protection software daily.

Antispyware Methods

Spyware-detection software scans your system for evidence of spyware. Spyware is any software that's installed without the user's consent or knowledge and reports data about the user back to the software owner. Spyware can record and relay anything from innocuous data about Web browsing habits to credit card numbers and other highly sensitive data that the user enters at a Web site or stores on the PC.

The best way to reduce your risk of spyware is to avoid getting it in the first place by reading all terms of service agreements carefully before you download software from the Internet, and avoid downloading anything advertised in spam or made available on public peer-to-peer networks. However, no matter how careful you are, spyware is still a risk. You should scan your system for spyware at least once every week -- more often is better.

Use Third-Party Tools

Computer hardware and software companies offer tools and utilities to keep your data safe. Some provide enhanced security capabilities, such as double passwords, to help protect against unauthorized access to networks and data. Other options include electronic e-mail signing and encryption, authentication, auditing of data import and export from multiple devices, hardware locks, and more.

Use Secure Passwords

Secure passwords are another component of data security, and they are even more important when you're working remotely. You should have your PC set up to require a password when you log on to the system. Entering a password every time you start your PC can be tedious, but the added security is worth the extra 30 seconds. What constitutes a good password? The following is a list of characteristics that add up to a secure password:

• Length: In general, the longer your password, the more difficult it is to crack. However, you do need to balance the benefit of a very long password with the inconvenience of remembering and typing it every time you need to log on to your PC. Eight characters should be the minimum length for passwords.
• Combination of letters (both upper case and lower case), numbers, and symbols: A password that includes uppercase letters, lowercase letters, numbers, and symbols (such as @, $, _, and &) is more secure than one that's made up of only letters.
• Difficult to guess: You should choose a password that's easy for you to memorize but difficult for anyone else to guess. These types of passwords might be easy to guess:

- Your name or birthday or family members' names or birthdays

- The name of your pet

- Your user name

- Common strings such as "abcdefg" or "12345"

- Keys that are adjacent on the keyboard, such as "qwerty" or "asdfgh"

- Any word found in the dictionary

However, you can increase the strength of an easy-to-guess password by combining words or misspelling them. For instance, if your name is Mary Smith, "msmith" wouldn't be a secure password. Instead, try "m@rY_sM1Th." It's 10 characters long and includes a number, both uppercase and lowercase letters, and two different symbols. It's still easy to remember but more difficult to crack.

About the Author

SSLRenewals.com is one of the largest SSL Renewals provider globally. Platinum partner for VeriSign, GeoTrust, Thawte & rapidSSL. Among the Internet security solutions SSLRenewals.com offers are SSL certificates from VeriSign, Thawte, GeoTrust, and RapidSSL. We buy SSL certificates in large quantities and pass the savings to you. To learn more about SSL Certificates visit https://www.sslrenewals.com/

Microsoft Minimum Password Length
Windows Server 2008: control passwords in group policy

Why Was My Article Rejected by an Article Directory?

As a small business owner or entrepreneur, no doubt you have a wealth of knowledge to share with your prospective clients. You also know that writing articles is a great way to introduce your services and expertise to the masses and increase your exposure to a wider audience via the internet. It just makes good business sense.

So, why on earth would any article directory not want to publish what you have to share?

Each article directory has its standards and reasons why it may not accept your article for publication. It is extremely important to follow their submission guidelines to the letter. No two article directories are alike. For example, some sites allow HTML and/or links in the body of the article - others don't.

Another thing to keep in mind is that articles are generally reviewed by a human editorial team to ensure that you are not spamming or simply submitting multiple links to drive traffic to your website. Not only will the editors pick up on this right away, so will your readers (if your article even gets published). The editors devote a significant amount of time reviewing each article to ensure the overall integrity of their directory and that of its contributors. 

I'm sure, as an author, you don't want to find your valuable contribution listed shoulder to shoulder with yet another thinly-disguised advertisement for a male enhancement product or some enticement for folks to gamble at a newly-opened casino.

From time to time, you may write an article that does not meet certain criteria in terms of its length, content or perhaps because of its formatting. Don't be discouraged by this. Make the necessary changes and resubmit it. It's well worth the effort to do so.

1) Keep self-promotion to a minimum

When reading your article, if someone is truly wowed by your content, they will want to learn more. They're not reading your article to find out more about 'you'.

They're actually reading to find out more about themselves and perhaps how you might be able to help them.

2) Be aware of the length of your article

Between 700 and 850 words is optimal for the length of most articles because most readers truly don't have that much time to devote their attention to what you have to say.

3) Keep the "affiliate" thing out of it

Reputable article submission sites hate when contributors try to use them as cheap and easy ways to make money just for the sake of making money.

Keep affiliate links entirely out of your articles.

In fact, some article directories won't allow you to include links to your own website or even to other websites within the body of your article, whether self-promotional or not.

4) Maximize your author resource box and/or profile

Here is where you are encouraged to promote yourself, your business, your services and your latest book, product or website. If a person likes what they've read in your article, naturally, they will want to find out more about you. Normally, you are allowed to alternate between different resource boxes depending on the content of your article and where you want to direct your reader.

If your article submission site allows, feel free to add a photo of yourself to your profile. This will immediately add a more human touch and will give readers the sense that you are a real person who is truly interested in helping THEM.

5) Ensure your article is properly formatted

If you have written an article in Microsoft Word, for example, there are many quirky things that can happen during the copy and paste process into an article directory. Sometimes you'll submit an article that you've composed in Word and then realize that it has been published with all sorts of weird characters and symbols. That doesn't look very cool or professional.

I usually take the Word document, save it as a plain text and then copy it into Notepad. This usually removes "smart quotes" and other things that can warp your article's formatting after the fact. (Always look at the article directory's preview before you submit.)

6) Keep track of your articles and where you have submitted them

It's easy to lose track of where you have already submitted an article and when. New article directories crop up every day and you may have written an article a year ago, but now want to submit it to some new sites. But you may wonder, "Have I already submitted that to XYZ?"

It's a good idea to keep a simple spreadsheet of your article submissions. Each page within the workbook can be devoted to one article and include the article's title, the date submitted and published, the link to the URL of the published article and the login information for each site. You can also add notes about each directory's key guidelines.

It serves as a permanent record of the history of the article. It avoids duplication and tracks those various email addresses and passwords that you might have used while submitting your articles in the past.

In summary, a well-circulated article can pay amazing dividends to your business and reputation. The internet has a very long memory. Make sure you maximize this excellent opportunity to reach out to others and maintain a valuable presence for many years to come by ensuring that your articles get published.  

Copyright 2008 Karen Braschuk

About the Author

Karen Braschuk is the owner of Office Support 911, a professional virtual assistance practice based in Ontario, Canada.

Microsoft Minimum Password Length