May 27 2011 11:37AM GMT

See How Strong Your Password Is With Tool From Microsoft

Tony Bradley Profile: Tony Bradley

Your passwords are the keys to your personal data and sensitive information. You have passwords for various online sites like Facebook, or Twitter, or Amazon. You have passwords for your banking and credit card sites. Guessing your username is generally trivial, so the password is really all that stands between an attacker and your data.

There is plenty of guidance online explaining tips and tricks to create more secure passwords, yet somehow each new breach or mass exposure of passwords illustrates that a majority of users still rely on things like “password”, or “12345” to protect their valuable information.

Well, if you are interested in ensuring that your password won’t be guessed or cracked in a matter of seconds, try entering it into this Microsoft tool to verify just how strong it is.

For those who may be concerned about divulging passwords to the Microsoft tool, Microsoft provides some assurances: “This password checker does not collect, store, or transmit information. The security of the passwords typed into this password checker is similar to the security of the password you enter when you log on to Windows. The password you enter is checked and validated on your computer. It is not sent over the Internet.”