The password for geeks is to mix, but not shake

    If you are afraid of keyloggers and are able to say without hesitation which letter in your password is in the Nth place, there is an original way for you to enter passwords for you, which will help to slightly increase their security.

    If the author of the site made a plain text field for entering the password (of course, such as “password” so that no one would spy), then you can enter the password letter by letter (out of order), of course, by moving the cursor with the mouse so that it is impossible to track the input order by clicks arrow keys.

    However, for the convenience of users, I propose to automate the mixing process for entering a password by setting a set of one-character cells instead of a simple text field:



    After entering each character, the cursor is automatically transferred to one of the randomly selected unfilled cells, which is highlighted by the background for better visibility. Of course, no one bothers to rearrange the cursor manually. When submitting the form, the password is collected in one line, while empty cells are skipped (not all passwords are equally long).

    Advantages of this solution:
    • protection against keyloggers, although all the password characters can still be caught, you will have to iterate to N! (factorial) options to find the correct order.
    • individual cells stimulate the user to choose longer passwords (and as you thought, when registering, you can enter the password in the same way) and show how much free space is left.
    • the password cannot be copied, which means it will have to be remembered, and not stored in a potentially unsafe place on the computer.
    • entering a password turns into an exciting game :)

    Obvious Cons:
    • password entry takes longer
    • entering the password “purely mechanically” will no longer work, it will need to be remembered and broken into separate letters in the mind, which requires serious mental effort.

    Warning: the idea was invented and published just for fun. I think it is obvious to everyone that this method cannot be made the only option , but if someone implements it on their site as an alternative way to enter a password and this will attract a couple more geeks to their audience, that will be good.

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