wrenstone•1mo agoProlific Poster

Spent $40 on a password manager and it just stopped a mess

Got a weird email last week saying someone tried to log into my main email from a new device. I used the same password for a few other things, like an old forum account. The password manager I bought last year for about $40 created a unique, crazy strong password for my email, so that attempt went nowhere. It saved me from what could have been a real headache of trying to lock everything down. If I hadn't paid for it, I'd probably still be using easy passwords I could remember. Has anyone else had a close call that made them glad they finally got a password manager?

3 comments

3 Comments

lewis.diana1mo ago

Man, my buddy's entire Steam library got cleaned out before he finally got one.

william9171mo agoTop Commenter

Yeah, the "cleaned out" part is the real killer. Tell your buddy to enable two-factor authentication on his Steam account right now, like today. He should also change his password to something completely new, not just a variation of the old one. Contacting Steam support is a pain but they can sometimes restore items, especially if he has proof of purchase. It's a brutal lesson, but locking it down now is the only way to stop it from happening again.

leo_campbell18d ago

Oh man, that reminds me of my cousin who lost his entire Guild Wars 2 inventory back in the day. He was so bummed he didn't touch the game for like two years. But here's the funny part - when he finally came back, he found out the hacker had actually leveled up his character and unlocked a bunch of achievements. So now my cousin jokes that the thief did him a favor by grinding while he was gone. Not that I'd ever recommend letting some random person borrow your account, but sometimes the universe works in weird ways I guess.