This Week’s Tip: The Dangers of Password Sharing

One of the best ways to protect information is to ensure that only authorized people have access to it. Passwords are the most common means of authentication but only work if they are complex and confidential. Many systems and services have been successfully breached because of non-secure and inadequate passwords. Here are four reasons why you should never share your passwords:

• Compromises account security. Sharing passwords for any account results in the account being less secure. Giving your password to someone you trust does not mean there is nothing to worry about. They may store the password on a compromised device or an unsecure location.
• Reused passwords. Most people use the same password to access more than one account. Sharing a reused password significantly increases the threat.
• More privileges than needed. You may want to give someone access to your account so they can find specific data, but we must remember that they will also have access to everything else in the account, such as email or other logins.
• Incidents will be logged as you. Any actions that the person you have granted access to will be recorded as you. In situations where the cause of an information security incident requires an investigation, sharing of credentials can make the process of determining who is responsible difficult.

If you find yourself in a situation where others may know an account password, you should change it immediately.

If someone on your team is conducting work on your behalf and they need access to your account, it is possible that the wrong access rights were assigned. In these instances, please contact the IT Service Desk and open a ticket to have the employee’s access rights be reviewed.

If you have any questions regarding this policy, please contact Information Security via Mark.Nagiel@SupremeLending.com. Thanks for participating in our team’s efforts to keep our company data safe.