workplace passwords

[hazelnut]

Making the workplace safer .....

 

CORPORATE DIRECTIVE NUMBER 88-570471

 

In order to increase the security of all company computing facilities,

and to avoid the possibility of unauthorized use of these facilities,

new rules are being put into effect concerning the selection of

passwords. All users of computing facilities are instructed to change

their passwords to conform to these rules immediately.

 

RULES FOR THE SELECTION OF PASSWORDS:

 

1. A password must be at least six characters long, and must not

contain two occurrences of a character in a row, or a sequence of two or

more characters from the alphabet in forward or reverse order. Example:

HGQQXP is an invalid password. GFEDCB is an invalid password.

 

2. A password may not contain two or more letters in the same position

as any previous password. Example: If a previous password was GKPWTZ,

then NRPWHS would be invalid because PW occurs in the same position in

both passwords.

 

3. A password may not contain the name of a month or an abbreviation

for a month. Example: MARCHBC is an invalid password. VWMARBC is an

invalid password.

 

4. A password may not contain the numeric representation of a month.

Therefore, a password containing any number except zero is invalid.

Example: WKBH3LG is invalid because it contains the numeric

representation for the month of March.

 

5. A password may not contain any words from any language. Thus, a

password may not contain the letters A, or I, or sequences such as AT,

ME, or TO because these are all words.

 

6. A password may not contain sequences of two or more characters which

are adjacent to each other on a keyboard in a horizontal, vertical, or

diagonal direction. Example: QWERTY is an invalid password. GHNLWT is

an invalid password because G and H are horizontally adjacent to each

other. HUKWVM is an invalid password because H and U are diagonally

adjacent to each other.

 

7. A password may not contain the name of a person, place, or thing.

Example: JOHNBOY is an invalid password.

 

Because of the complexity of the password selection rules, there is

actually only one password which passes all the tests. To make the

selection of this password simpler for the user, it will be distributed

to all supervisors. All users are instructed to obtain this password

from his or her supervisor and begin using it immediately.

[DennisD]

I thought for a moment there Hazel you were gonna ask us to work out the password.

 

My brain couldn't have taken that.

[YoKenny]

Making the workplace safer .....

 

CORPORATE DIRECTIVE NUMBER 88-570471

That sounds like IBM's RACF that I had to sell and support way back when.

 

The auditors loved it but the Sys Progs hated it as they could not get into the MVS system to apply their magic tweaks without going through the Change Management System