Write it down

Have you changed your password for something lately? Did you have trouble? You can absolutely cut down on the pain and suffering if you make a note of these tips.

When you change your password for something somewhere, you must change it everywhere.

A world where you can unlock your car by pressing a button, but where you need a password to fire up your computer is annoying.

I often help people who changed their email password on their computer and then could not get email on their phones or tablets.

Here’s the thing: You’re not changing the password on your computer.

You’re using your computer to change the password that’s kept in a secure area on your provider’s server.

You use that same user name/email address and password to access your email from every device.

Once you change it online, change the settings for your email apps on your phones and tablets, and if you’re using an email program on your computer, change it there.

If you don’t do that, you’re not going to get your email there.

This is true for any password you use to sign in to anything online.

Do you have an Apple ID? Did you reset your password from your iPad? If you did, you need to change that password on your iPhone, too.

And on iTunes on your computer.

And please update the records you keep of your password information.

None of us can keep all this in our heads. Write down your user name and password. Write down what it’s for!

I don’t have to count sheep at night. Instead I replay in my head the image of people picking up scraps of paper and post-it notes, and people paging through notebooks filled with passwords…and no mention of what those passwords are for, or of the user name that accompanies them.

Try this:

                                                PASSWORDS

WHAT IS IT?                USER NAME/EMAIL              PASSWORD                 NOTES

Shaw email                  [email protected]             $0rryN0tS0rry              changed May 2011

Microsoft ID                [email protected]     Te$ting123           Sign in to computer; Sign in to Office365
                                                                                          
AppleID                       [email protected]                1bAdAAPL           iTunes, iPad, iPhone           

You get the idea.

To recover your passwords, your account information must be up-to-date

You can reset your forgotten passwords in online services. Why write down your passwords if you can just reset them?

• Can’t remember your AppleID password?
• Your Gmail/Google password?
• Your Microsoft password?

You can always click on that link that says reset password.

And maybe that will work. Microsoft of Google or Apple will send you another link to click on or a code to type in and you can recover your account and change your password, right?

Right. That will work if:

• You provided another email address, or
• You provided a phone number, and
• You have access to it.

If you provided a telephone number that’s not current, or you used to be with Shaw and now you’re with Telus and you don’t have access to your old email, you’re out of luck.

Keep your account information current! Keep a record of your login/password information! And don’t forget to update every device that uses a password that you change.

We’re almost there

Just two more weeks until The Payton & Dillon Budd Memorial Ride for the Canadian Mental Health Association. I’m so grateful to all of you who’ve sponsored me in the Ride Don’t Hide event.

There is still time! Please click on this link to make your secure on-line donation and support the CMHA: https://goo.gl/WnnSd3.

Any amount you can spare is much appreciated. Thank you!

This article is written by or on behalf of an outsourced columnist and does not necessarily reflect the views of Castanet.