3 Ways to check if hackers can access your email account

Hackers these days have succeeded in carving an infamous reputation for themselves worldwide. Their activities in the last two decades make internet security very crucial as far as any online activity is concerned. Top Tech players such as Facebook and Linkedin have had a fair share of website breaches.

The effect of these breaches cannot be overemphasised. The main motivation is money or ransom payment where hackers harvest user data such as usernames and passwords and auction it on the dark web unbeknown to the hacked victim. However, I believe most of the dangerous group of hackers are those who do it for fun.  They get satisfaction from successfully launching Denial of Service(DoS) attacks on websites hosting account and stealing email account details to harvest debit or credit card information among other things. So you see, the bottom line is money after all.

How do I secure my email account

The truth is that you can never be too careful. The hackers becoming more sophisticated every other day. However, some safety precautions can be taken to ensure your login credentials are not in the public domain. A rule of thumb is that, if you can remember your username and password, then it can definitely be hacked. Hackers often have the resources to conduct brute force guesses and may be successful at cracking your login details.

Cybersecurity experts often advice unsuspecting users to avoid using names of relatives and birthdays as login details. This is because such details can easily be sourced from social media accounts and offer hackers more chances of cracking your password by brute force.

It is often advised users constantly check if websites they have accounts with have been breached recently? We will discuss how to do that in the next section.

The use of verified autogenerated passwords is also useful to acquire passwords that cannot be cracked by brute force.

According to experts,  one of the best ways to protect yourself online is to use unique and strong passwords for every account such that even if your data is still secured for other sites even one site is compromised.

How to check if hackers can access your email account

1.  Check if your email account has ever be ‘pwned’

‘pwned’ pronounced as pawned in the internet security circle is used as a slang for breached or compromised. This can be done on Troy Hunt’s haveibeenpwned website  who is a  Microsoft Regional Director.

This website is a free resource which has record of breached data popular website where users can quickly check by inputting their email address as shown in the below and then instantly returns result such as ‘Oh no — pwned! which means your password might have been compromised in recent data breach if you have not changed it since the last time the breach occurred.  Result which says Good news — no pwnage found! may suggest you are safe from recent data breaches.

See below some of the top breaches in history. If you have accounts with them and haven’t changed your credentials for a very long time. you may have been ‘pwned’ and need to act fast.

2. Check the estimated time your password can be cracked

There are  varying views from experts on how to secure your password from hackers but the truth is there is no surest single way to go by for in as much as top players such as LinkedIn, Adobe and Facebook have been ‘pwned’ before, it is rather easy to hack unsuspecting users who rely on the top directly or indirectly rely on the top players for securing their details.

An inexpensive and free way is to check how secure your password is by using Mark Wales’ estimated time to crack password website from his small Hadron Collider Project. This website gives the time a computer can take to crack your password in as low as nanoseconds!. As can be seen, a password such ‘enewsghana’ can be cracked in the estimated time shown below!

You are further given options on how to strengthen your password. Users are to note that  ‘these sites is for educational use and also the developers mention that due to limitations of the technology involved, the results cannot always be accurate. Also, tested passwords are not sent over the internet.

Join our WhatsApp Group to get notified when LATEST NEWS IN GHANA & JOBS IN GHANA are posted. Click Here to Join EnewsGhana Website WhatsApp Group

3. Test the complexity of your password

The use of tools to assist with making your password exist and users need to take advantage of it to stay safe online. Many of such tools exist which are paid services. But my favourite free online tool for generating my password is the password generation tool  which offers users to create passwords from 6(weak) to 2048(unbelievable)! characters while meeting 9 stringent conditions. The website further gives you 39 tips on how to prevent hackers from cracking your credentials.

1password is also a useful website that autogenerates complex websites but the free offer is only for 30 days and has the added advantage of being integrated with most websites so all passwords can be controlled in one place.

Another useful online password generation tool alternative is provided by safety detectives. The tool is straightforward to and free. It creates passwords from words, that should be easier to remember, which is why I use it. For example, the word “benediction” is automatically converted to b=nedicT10n.  The good part is the autogenerated passwords are super easy to remember (All you require is at least one password to remember as a master password)

Macbooks normally suggest autogenerated passwords which are strongly recommended.

In conclusion, data breaches are a matter of great concern these days and online users must make a conscious effort not to fall victim to these hackers and gain satisfaction from stealing people’s data. In short, using the checks provided above, one can likely generate robust login credentials which will be a great pain for hackers to crack by the combination of know methods such as brute force or dictionary attack method and social engineering.

Before you fall, victim, make sure, you are using a variety of characters, password length is not short, it is not just a word!
Users can also opt for password managers which are being patronised lately, These include dashlane website which allows you to securely store up to 50 passwords on the free plan.

Stay safe online.

Source: Enewsghana.com