What Do You Think About The Existence Of Internet?

Hello there,

Don't start contemplating if the existence of internet has changed the world for better or not. As an internet user, We are aware how lots of businesses had moved from offline to online for mass visibility. The internet has done more good than bad since it came into existence. Although, One big problem faced on the internet is security. Thousands of different transactions are being executed daily. Hackers penetrate, steal funds or data from user's accounts.

From research:,

There is a hacker attack every 39 seconds

The Problem

I have read blogs advising users on how to prevent hackers from hacking their accounts by not using password related to their personal info, not using same passwords across all platforms and making sure they use a strong password.

Let me ask you this: How safe is your password ?

An average internet user prefer to use a non complicated password. They prefer password that is short and easy to remember.
Everyone truly don't wanna stress their brain thinking about their password(s) when it's time to access their profile on different platforms. Due to that lazy act, Many hackers takes advantage of that. At the end of the day, these users get hacked.

One Of The Solutions To Cyber Security

There is a proven method known as Diceware. This is an act of building long, strong, an easy to remember passwords with the aid of rolling a dice and then looking up the dice result from a Diceware dictionary to create a passphrase.

Types of Diceware Word list

The first creator of Diceware word list is Arnold G. Reinhold. His wordlist requires a dice to be rolled five times to get a phrase. And his wordlist can be downloaded Here

Another set of wordlist is EFF's Long Wordlist [.txt]. It also requires a dice to be rolled five times. And it's designed for memorability and passphrase strength compared to Reinhold wordlist.

EFF later released another Short Wordlist#1 [.txt] (which contain 1296 words). This requires the password generator to roll four dice at once. Or a dice four times. The phrases on short word list are easier to type but doesn't provide much strength.

Yet again, They released EFF's Short Wordlist #2 [.txt] also requires the rolling of four dice to get a phrase. But this time, the phrases featured are longer phrases that may be more memorable.

An Example

The rule behind this method is, Roll a Dice to generate digits, then look up the meaning on any of your preferred wordlist dictionary.
In this example, I will be rolling a Dice five times , then use Reinhold wordlist.

After i rolled a dice five times, i got these digits 13224 . When i checked for the corresponding passphrase on Diceware.wordlist, it means bag. I had to roll the dice five times in four places before i could create a long, strong and memorable passphrase.
I rolled the dice 20times. But group the digits in four places

These are the digits and phrases after rolling and checking Diceware.wordlist.

13224 = bag
33413 = hump
21451 = coup
33516 = ia

From the above result, i was able to generate this passphrase baghumpcoupia.
As you can see, This passphrase is memorable, strong and long.

Creating strong passphrase manually using this method is tiring. Because you have to physically roll a dice, write down the results, search Diceware.wordlist, And then bringing together the phrases to make a passphrase.

Any Better Solution ?

Yes!. An open source project created by JEFF ISAAK a software developer will ease the stress of physically rolling a dice and looking up Diceware.wordlist.

Repository

https://github.com/jeffisaak/diceware-pass-gen

Introduction

Diceware password generator is an Android application that automatically generates a strong a memorable passphrase using the Diceware method explained above. Install it from Play Store then launch it to begin. Here's the screen that appears after launching the app.

The very first time I got to the screen, I thought there would be an option to role a dice, and another option to view the diceware.wordlist 😂
But no!. Using this application is as easy as clicking on a single button then the whole processes of rolling dice, checking the phrase is done and you're provided with your password. Cool right ? 🤗

Creating My First Strong Password With Diceware Password Generator

When I clicked on New password, The generated password displayed at the top.

Then I clicked on copy to clipboard which prompted a warning message about how other applications might have access to view copied password on my clipboard.

I clicked on Continue. That I clearly understood that statement.
Finally, here's the password bmw tuna citrus lard angola. But keeping the words separated won't be accepted when creating an account. So let us bring the words together
bmwtunacitruslardqangola.
Wow! Who on Earth would ever think about this ?🙌
Congratulations on creating your first entropy meaningful password.

Features

There aren't much features available on Diceware password generator mobile app. Below are the features available as of when I was making this article.

• Create and copy password

• A Slider To Determine How Long Your Password Should Be Generated.

The slider is an option to determine how many times a dice should be rolled or to pick the length of the password.
The shorter the password, The less stronger it is.

Below are two passwords I generated.

Shorter slider, shorter the password

Longer slider, longer the password

Ability to switch between wordlists

I was able to switch between the four wordlist we have on the app. I have already explained the different types of wordlist used in Diceware.

Ability to switch source of random numbers

User's are allowed to decide the source of the generated digits. The options here are:

• Android pseudo-random number generator ( an inbuilt Android number generator)
• Random.org ( an online Number generator )
• Dice ( an embedded dice in the app).

Recall: I manually created a password using dice and Reinhold wordlist.

I was able to generate these digits after rolling the dice 20times ( 5times in 4places). The outcomes are:

13224
33413
21451
33516

And I got this phrases bag hump coup ia

Prove The Above Digits and Passphrases

Since we are allowed to select source of random numbers, let use select Dice as the source and then punch in these digits 13224, 33413, 21451, 33516.

Use this settings so as to re-create the password we initially generated.

Then Click on new password. A new page with numbers ranging from 1 to 6 on a dice will appear.

This page is known as The dice roll entry. Now it's time we punch in these digits 13224, 33413, 21451, 33516.

Note: You're required to punch in total of 20 digits. And the amount of values required reduces after punching in each 5digits.

The password should display just after punching the last 5digits
< Center> generated Password

As you can see, we got the same passwords when we manually used the Reinhold wordlist.

App Permission

Diceware password generator only has access to network. It is required to access Random.org for random numbers.

Diceware password generator Vs Others

I have seen many reasons I prefer and would recommend Diceware password generator( open source) to others. I had to download another Diceware password generator from playstore. On launching it,

• An Ad displayd at the button of the app.
• The generated words wasn't arranged horizontally.(you have to scroll to view the rest of the words)
• Users don't have the chance to punch in their desired digits. ( The app automatically roll the dice )

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Concussion

It's awesome knowing how far we've gone. We've learnt:

• Reasons and how possible accounts are hacked.

We also looked at the problems and solutions to cyber security.
We learnt about Diceware. A method used to solve creation of weak passwords.

Don't forget, we also manually created a Diceware password.🤗

We got introduced to an open source projects that works on Android Os. Enabling Android users to generate Diceware passwords without wasting time.

We looked at the differences between app Diceware password generator and another similar application.

Thank you all for reading. I believe you can now create strong passwords for your accounts.

See you next time. Bye.