5 Ways Lastpass Makes You More Secure On The Internet

The benefits of using a password manager far outweigh the potential cons.
Here’s 5 ways that Lastpass makes you more secure.

Source: Pixabay, Public Domain

Too many people are still trying to remember passwords in their head, or on paper.

Are you one of them?

You may feel more secure, perhaps you don’t want to entrust your precious passwords to a password manager.

However, you are likely a lot less secure than you think.

While no system is perfect, any password manager worth its salt will have multiple ways of keeping you safe.

Not only that, but it will prevent many common mistakes you might make, when relying on just your memory.

In this post I will outline 5 reasons why Lastpass, my favoured password manager, makes you more secure.

Read on to find out more.

Lastpass: One Password Instead Of Many

The first thing that Lastpass does is to take away the “buzz” in your mind.

In the normal run of things (without a password manager), you know how it goes:

You desperately try to remember which password to use for the website you need access to.

If you’ve progressed a little further, you might be thinking of which variation on your chosen theme is the one to use.

And yes, we’ve all been there – “password 1”, “password 2”, “password_3”, and so on.

The problem with this approach is many-fold

• you forget which password you need
• you end up typing it wrong, resulting in frustration and wasted time
• in the worst case, your account gets locked too
• if a hacker gets hold of one of them, it’s not too much trouble to work out the rest

Lastpass does away with all that and gives you one master password to login to the software.

Once logged into Lastpass, everything else is done for you.

Lastpass 2 Factor Authentication

“Ok”, I hear you say, “I get the idea, but can’t a hacker just steal my master password?”

Well, Lastpass makes it extremely difficult.

1. Lastpass will help make sure you pick a really strong master password
2. They encrypt everything and don’t store your master password on the server (see below for more on this)
3. You can add a second factor to your setup

A strong, long, password makes it very difficult for a hacker to guess what it is, or at least take a very long time to work it out (we’re talking years here).

Having a second factor means that you need something else (like your smartphone) in addition to your password, in order to login.

Even if a hacker were able to grab your password, then they still can’t use your account.

2 factor authentication is available for all Lastpass customers, even free customers, so there’s no excuse for not activating it.

Lastpass Generates Passwords

Hopefully, you follow good advice on creating strong passwords and stick to it.

However, the best password is one that even you don’t know.

A totally random character string will still beat a carefully thought out password, or pass phrase, hands down, as long as it’s long enough (excuse the pun).

A hacker can’t use a dictionary attack on a random string, so they are forced into trying other methods which will take a lot longer.

Whenever you sign up to a new website, click the option to let Lastpass generate the password for you.

Next time you login, Lastpass will enter the password for you.

Encrypted Data, Encrypted Locally

While Lastpass saves your data in the cloud, it makes sure that everything is encrypted on your machine, before it is sent anywhere.

I won’t go into detail on how they do this, or what encryption techniques they use (you can check it out here, if you want the technical low down).

The important thing is that if a hacker tries to listen in on the transfer, all they will get is garbage.

Since you’ll be keeping your master password to yourself, Lastpass elpoyees don’t have access to your electronic keys.

This means it’s impossible for the company to get into your account, or tell you what your password is – even if they wanted to.

Convenience Features Reduce Temptation To Cheat

In my opinion, all the above features add up to an excellent package.

However, there is one more thing I really like about it, which isn’t a function built into the software.

It’s that once you’ve got up and running with it, you won’t be nearly so tempted to go back to your old ways.

Without a password manager, the temptation to choose, say “password1” can be overwhelming, especially when you’re under pressure.

With Lastpass, there’s no reason to do that at all and every reason to stay safe on the ‘Net.

The convenience of generating passwords and logging into websites is taken care of, so you’ll save loads of time (and hassle) too.

What’s not to like?

Question: Where do you store your passwords?

Disclaimer: I am not an employee of Lastpass, nor was I paid to write this article. I am simply a very satisfied user of their software.