Very few computer users seem to have woken up to the risks of using weak passwords and the same ones for every site they visit. With social networking and other internet accounts now even more popular, there’s plenty on offer for hackers and by using the same password to access Facebook, Amazon and your online bank account, you’re making it much easier for them.

Once one password has been compromised, it’s only a matter of time before the fraudsters will be able to gain access to your other accounts and steal information for financial gain.

Furthermore, it’s important that users don’t use a word from the dictionary as their password. It’s easy to understand why computer users pick dictionary words as they’re much easier to remember, but as I explain in this video a good trick is to pick a sentence and just use the first letter of every word to make up your password

Yahoo, Twitter and LinkedIn have asked users to change their details, days after gossip site Gawker was hacked.

Online game World of Warcraft, which has more than 12 million subscribers, has also asked some users to reset their passwords.

Blizzard, the company behind the game, said it was an attempt to “minimise the effects” of the Gawker breach.

Although thousands of Twitter accounts were compromised after the attack, there have been few other reports of damage directly linked to the breach.

Many companies, however, have taken steps to identify users at risk and warn them before an exploit can take place. A spokesman for LinkedIn said it necessary to take “proactive security measures” to screen users thought to be in danger.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-11998648

The tools will let people stop a site they are visiting sharing information about what they do with other sites.

Users will be able to create lists stating that their data will only be shared with sites they want to see it.

The news comes as the US government criticises the computer industry for its slow progress on protecting user privacy.

In a blog post, Microsoft said many people did not realise that when they visit a website what they look for, view or buy there is often shared with other companies without that user’s knowledge.

In IE9, Microsoft is planning to introduce what it calls “Tracking Protection Lists” that it says will work like the “Do Not Call” lists that limit who marketing firms can cold call.

The lists will be defined by users and limit the sharing of data only to those sites which a user is happy to see the information. When switched on, the system might mean that some adverts or other features do not appear when users visit sites.

Anyone will be able to write a list and share it with others so they can get the same protection, said Microsoft.

It also plans to release the formatting and standards for the lists under an open licence so other browser makers can adopt them.

The tracking system will be turned off by default and users will have to “opt in” to use it.

Microsoft said early versions of the tools would be included in the version of IE9 due for release in early 2011.

It is not the first browser to offer such functionality. Chrome, Firefox and Opera also allow users to create lists of trusted sites.

The announcement comes in the wake of a report from the US Federal Trade Commission report into online privacy.

In it the FTC said that industry self-regulation of privacy was “too slow” and has “failed to provide adequate and meaningful protection”.

It called for consumers to be given far more choice about the data being collected about them. It recommended the creation of a “Do Not Track” mechanism that would stop the wholesale collection of information about where people go online and what they are interested in.