Someone once said that there are four ages of man (some have it as five, but four works for my illustration), likewise my experience tells me that there are four ages of remembering a new password:

• Age 1 – Typing the old password right up until it’s about to get locked-out before remembering that perhaps there was a reason why the system wasn’t remembering your password.
• Age 2 – Typing in most of the old password before remembering that you changed it. Sitting for a few seconds trying to recall what the new password is. Mistyping the new password a few times before you get it right.
• Age 3 – Before typing look at the screen and realise that there’s something you should be typing, but are unable to recall what it is. Remembering the new password and type it in.
• Age 4 – Type in the new password every time. Come to a system you use less regularly. Type in your new password a few times before realising that you’ve not changed your password on this particular system. Sit for a long while trying to remember what your old password was, give up and get the password reset.

Or is it only me?

I’ve thought for a while that the way we enforce ‘strong’ passwords was dumb and actually made them easier to crack, not harder.

xkcd sums it up in a way that I’ve never quite been able to:

The conclusion says it all.