If I only use the system once a month, and you make the password expire every month, then every time I log in, I will have an expired password.
And if you fail to tie the password into something sensible so that I have a universal password for as many systems as possible, it will frustrate me to no end. It will be impossible for me to remember my ever-changing password, and so I will record it in a plain-text file on my hard drive, thus granting access to anyone who knows my Windows password, which should hopefully be only me, and is what you should have done in the first place.
And the frustration will be so bad that I will go gripe to my friends and they will become aware of my breach of sound security principles in recording my password on my hard drive. And those friends are online. So the world will know.
Just saying, is all.
Where I work, you will still get fired.
Re:Yes but...
sigzero on 2006-05-01T17:40:45
I should mention thought that we have 90 day, can't use last 5, must be "hard" passwords. So that isn't too bad.
Re:Yes but...
jplindstrom on 2006-05-01T22:38:22
Since when did "can't use previous n passwords" result in something other than simple variations on the standard password?Re:Yes but...
sigzero on 2006-05-02T02:06:15
It doesn't. I didn't mean to imply (and I don't think I did) that it did. Certainly my experince is people just tack a number on the end or something (i.e. B0b1, B0b2, etc.).
I was just being cheeky with him and not serious at all./p.
Re:Yes but...
jdavidb on 2006-05-02T05:11:49
It's hard to be serious in the face of such overwhelming crap, anyway. This journal entry was immediately preceeded by a gripe session with two important security people in my company who thankfully work in my building. They agree the situation is crap.
Re:Yes but...
jdavidb on 2006-05-02T05:08:55
I never reuse passwords. At least, not for work systems.
Re:Yes but...
merlyn on 2006-05-02T00:44:14
I wouldn't mind getting fired from a place that pays no attention to the human aspect of security.Re:Yes but...
sigzero on 2006-05-02T02:08:30
lol...well you are probably in a better position that I am to say something like that. : )
Once again, I was being cheeky and not totally serious. That didn't come out very well. Ah well.
Re:Yes but...
jdavidb on 2006-05-02T05:10:25
Wouldn't be the first time. (I honestly intend that to be funny, and I hope you take it as such, but if you find it otherwise, then I apologize.)
You keep replying in my journal letting me know how much better off I'd be if I didn't work here (see the entries about the web blocking)
... so, when you gonna offer me a job? :) Re:Yes but...
jdavidb on 2006-05-02T05:15:01
I'm not especially worried about getting fired. I'm not exactly at the point where I'd welcome it, and there'd be some tension in my throat and an elevated heartbeat for a couple of hours or days. But I think in the long term I'd find something else and do fine.
And so I don't much worry about griping about it online!
:) (Though I've got to admit when I logged on tonight and saw I had four messages I was really curious if someone from my group did somehow stumble on here...) Every time I get gritched about something at work, or else fear something's not going to go right, my wife always says, "Oh, well, the worst they can do is fire you." And then she goes on to let me know that she wouldn't be worried in the slightest if that happened, because she has confidence I'd find another opportunity somewhere.
Re:Yes but...
sigzero on 2006-05-02T18:48:30
Sounds like you have a pretty mellow wife. Mine would freak out and has!:) Re:Yes but...
jdavidb on 2006-05-03T02:33:25
She is pretty mellow, but it may be because I went through getting laid off about three or four months after we met. When we first met, she saw a solid financial future. Then she saw me at the absolute bottom, scared and crying. (Well, I'm not sure she was personally there for the crying part, but it did happen. After I discovered my phone message waiting indicator wasn't working and I'd missed a job opportunity!) We've already faced the worst, and both have confidence about what we'd do if it happened again.
