Kanye West made the headlines as usual last year, but not always for the usual reasons, when he was caught on video tapping a password into his smartphone.

If this wasn’t insecure enough, the password was 000000. Hopefully he’s changed it by now, but even if it hadn’t been seen by half the world’s population, how long would it have taken for a cyber criminal to crack such a weak password?

It can take minutes now to crack an eight-figure password, using connected computers to try out millions of combinations a second until they hit the jackpot. And that’s assuming the password is genuinely random, which it probably isn’t.

Too many passwords to remember

The average UK worker uses nearly 200 passwords and that number is only going to increase as we’re encouraged to interact more online with everyone, from supermarkets to the NHS. And what about the internet of things? Will we soon need a password to boil the kettle?

The truth is that while apps and online services make life more convenient, setting up yet another new account has the opposite effect. We may not be so concerned about security for a hotel loyalty scheme or a social media account, so we cheat when invited to create a unique password by reusing and old, easy to remember one.

But if cyber criminals get access to one account, they can muscle in on your home Wi-Fi account, HMRC login, your bank accounts - your whole life.

Password management services - all your eggs in one basket?

As an alternative to a drawer full of sticky notes covered in passwords, some people are now using password management apps. They act like an electronic safe, storing all your passwords behind a single security code, but nothing attracts a criminal’s attention like a locked safe.

The only thing you can guarantee is that when one side improves its security, the other finds ways around it. So is it possible to avoid storing passwords altogether?

Forghetti - doing away with password storage

At forghetti we’re basically a bunch of techies who got fed up with the whole password remembering problem, so we came up with a new solution that doesn’t store passwords.

Using the forghetti App you can generate extremely long and complicated passwords for every online account you own and then forget them.

To gain entry to an account, you use a simple doodle on your keypad that only you know. This initiates a massively complex set of algorithms to generate and regenerate the password.

You don’t store your passwords and neither do we. Not only do you enjoy greater online security but you get to save your memory for more important things.

To find out more about how forghetti works, take a look at our website.