Appreciation post: My home network was way safer after I switched from a default router password to a full passphrase

For the longest time, I just used the admin password sticker on my router. Last month, a friend who does IT told me to change it to a random 4-word phrase like 'correct-horse-battery-staple'. I did, and the next week my ISP flagged a brute force attack that the old password would have failed against in minutes. The passphrase stopped it cold. Has anyone else seen a real difference after making a switch like this?

3 comments

3 Comments

calebhayes1mo ago

Is a passphrase really that much better? I just use a long random string of letters and numbers. Seems like the key is length and not using common words.

jakef661mo ago

Oh man, "correct-horse-battery-staple" is the classic. My old password was basically "router123" and I pictured a hacker just sighing in disappointment when they got in. Now I use something like "blue-coffee-table-frog" and I imagine them getting to "blue-coffee-table" and just giving up to go bother someone with a password like "password." It's the little things.

schmidt.willow16d ago

Honestly though, doesn't the whole "common words but random" thing still leave you open to dictionary attacks if the hackers know what they're doing? Or is five words just too much for them to bother with?