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All Things Microsoft => Microsoft as a Company => Topic started by: Zombie9920 on 20 July 2003, 21:54

Title: Inkblot Passwords
Post by: Zombie9920 on 20 July 2003, 21:54

Are inkblots meaningless smears of ink, or the secret key to your personality? Though most psychologists no longer use inkblots to determine the twists and turns of your psyche, sometimes they pay attention to the stories you tell yourself about the blobs. Adam Stubblefield, an intern with Microsoft Research, thought that our ability to tell ourselves unique stories about inkblots might be a secret key to a strong digital lock - the online password.

Stubblefield, and his manager at MSR, Dan Simon, knew that people are the weakest link in secure computing environments. They knew that users generally pick weak passwords because they can remember them. They tend to use birthdays, pet's names, spouse's names or birthdays, or a favorite hobby. If a computer system forces us to pick a strong password, we often write it on a post-it note and stick it to the side of our computer, where it can be read and used by any passerby.

Give Me A Hint

"Good passwords are hard to remember. And easy to remember passwords are easy for other people to guess. What we wanted to do is give people a hint to help them remember a good password," said Simon. They needed a hint that would mean something to the user, but not to anyone else. They wanted to use some type of image-based authentication. But there were problems. Most of the methods had what they considered to be a fatal flaw.


Entire article (http://research.microsoft.com/displayArticle.aspx?id=417)

This is an innovative move by MS.

Title: Inkblot Passwords
Post by: Laukev7 on 20 July 2003, 22:14

Sorry, Zombie, but I have already posted this.

http://forum.microsuck.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=1&t=000521 (http://forum.microsuck.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=1&t=000521)

Title: Inkblot Passwords
Post by: Zombie9920 on 20 July 2003, 22:20

Geeese. It seems like everything I post has already been posted.

What happened to the good ol' days when nobody posted anything constructive because they were too busy flaming everybody(acting like children)?

Title: Inkblot Passwords
Post by: Laukev7 on 20 July 2003, 22:37

I guess the disputes are over. And most of the old regulars have left, too.