Checking yesterday, I had a woman come through my line who used the wrong PIN too many times, which caused her card to lock up. Any cashier/checker (whatever you want to call us) has had this happen. The cards tend to give you 3 tries and then the card locks for 24 hours, just in case someone has stolen your card. Because crooks aren't smart enough to try again after 24 hours, apparently.
The woman in this case just pulled out another card and grumbled about having too many passwords to remember them all, and not for the first time, I agreed. We have become a password driven society. Not that I don't understand, as someone who has had her information & identity stolen, I completely understand the need for all these passwords. But at the same time, she's right. We have PINs and passwords for every single thing.
Myself, I only have one bank card, so I don't have to worry about PINS, but passwords, oh yeah. I have three e-mail accounts. I have one where my daughter's father can contact me, but that one was broken into, so I changed the password and I also made a new e-mail account and switched all my important, financial related material to that one. But I didn't want to close the other, because informing my ex of a new e-mail involves communication with him, something that I will go to extreme measures to avoid. So I kept the violated e-mail, but with a new password , and I have the other. I can check that one stress-free. There are no ex e-mails waiting to pounce. But that is another password. Then I have the e-mail that is linked with this blog. Being that I have had information stolen, all of my accounts have different passwords.
On top of the three e-mail accounts, I have a school log-in and password, bank password, energy bill password, cable password, Netflix password, a password to my daughter's school, and a password to all my favorite online shopping stores. That is over thirty different passwords!!!! Consisting of numerals, capitals, and no words that are contained in the dictionary.
No wonder my brain is mush. No wonder I walk into a room sometimes and can't remember what I was going to do in there. All these passwords have taken up all the space in my brain. I can completely sympathize with these people that can't remember their PINs and have ten different cards, because I will sit there are cycle through passwords on all of my sites, but I don't have a three try limit. My e-mail is just like, "Haha, nope, try again." Imagine if there were a three try limit; I would never get a chance to write a post for this blog again, because I can never remember which password belongs to which account. I remember all the passwords, but to match up, on the first three tries, which one went with which site, I would be locked out.
That's like the end of the world for me, forget all these other false alarm Doom days. The world will really end on the day that I can't get into my e-mail accounts or do my online shopping. At least, I'll feel that way. I'd rather face the zombie apocalypse then lose access to my online accounts. (Not that a zombie apocalypse wouldn't be interesting, and I know who I'm feeding to the zombies first, fair warning.)
But the point is, I suppose, that we all probably have this problem from time to time. We have too many passwords.
The woman in this case just pulled out another card and grumbled about having too many passwords to remember them all, and not for the first time, I agreed. We have become a password driven society. Not that I don't understand, as someone who has had her information & identity stolen, I completely understand the need for all these passwords. But at the same time, she's right. We have PINs and passwords for every single thing.
Myself, I only have one bank card, so I don't have to worry about PINS, but passwords, oh yeah. I have three e-mail accounts. I have one where my daughter's father can contact me, but that one was broken into, so I changed the password and I also made a new e-mail account and switched all my important, financial related material to that one. But I didn't want to close the other, because informing my ex of a new e-mail involves communication with him, something that I will go to extreme measures to avoid. So I kept the violated e-mail, but with a new password , and I have the other. I can check that one stress-free. There are no ex e-mails waiting to pounce. But that is another password. Then I have the e-mail that is linked with this blog. Being that I have had information stolen, all of my accounts have different passwords.
On top of the three e-mail accounts, I have a school log-in and password, bank password, energy bill password, cable password, Netflix password, a password to my daughter's school, and a password to all my favorite online shopping stores. That is over thirty different passwords!!!! Consisting of numerals, capitals, and no words that are contained in the dictionary.No wonder my brain is mush. No wonder I walk into a room sometimes and can't remember what I was going to do in there. All these passwords have taken up all the space in my brain. I can completely sympathize with these people that can't remember their PINs and have ten different cards, because I will sit there are cycle through passwords on all of my sites, but I don't have a three try limit. My e-mail is just like, "Haha, nope, try again." Imagine if there were a three try limit; I would never get a chance to write a post for this blog again, because I can never remember which password belongs to which account. I remember all the passwords, but to match up, on the first three tries, which one went with which site, I would be locked out.
That's like the end of the world for me, forget all these other false alarm Doom days. The world will really end on the day that I can't get into my e-mail accounts or do my online shopping. At least, I'll feel that way. I'd rather face the zombie apocalypse then lose access to my online accounts. (Not that a zombie apocalypse wouldn't be interesting, and I know who I'm feeding to the zombies first, fair warning.)
But the point is, I suppose, that we all probably have this problem from time to time. We have too many passwords.
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