Student passwords to expire

After several emails, many students are no doubt aware that Information Technology Services (ITS) will be implementing some changes to ASU student passwords in the coming weeks that will require them to be changed.  

All current passwords for ASU students will expire on Feb. 28, and will continue to expire every 90 days going forward.  Students must now utilize ‘complex' passwords in order to comply with auditor requirements.  

New passwords must contain at least eight characters, at least one number, one lowercase letter, one uppercase letter.  

They cannot begin with a number, and cannot contain your username or a symbol, which can interfere with certain wireless applications on campus.

Darla Fletcher, director of technical services and support at ITS, explained why these requirements were chosen for the new passwords.

"Upon following these requirements, the passwords would be considered complex.  A lot of applications, such as Apple and iTunes accounts have been utilizing this so it just puts us in line with best practice," she said.

Fletcher also emphasized that this was purely for security reasons.

"We're very committed to student security and protecting our students to the best of our ability, and this is a best practice model so that we don't have people out there typing the word ‘password' for their password," Fletcher said.

"We are also educating the community to be careful and to follow some of these business practices."

Fletcher also noted that these changes are unrelated to the recent PIN number changes that took place last semester around the release of final grades.

Fletcher explained why the 90-day expiration mandate will be taking place following the initial password switch.

‘This is being done for two reasons: to ensure that all students are following the new password requirements, in addition to providing another layer of security over personal information.  This is just another way to keep passwords updated."

Students can change their passwords by going to the "Current Students" tab at the ASU website (http:www2.astate.edu,) and clicking on the ‘Change Your Password" tab.  This can also be done at the "MyCampus" portal's login screen as well.

Eric Barnett, senior LAN and wireless administrator at ITS, provided his thoughts on the situation via a blog that will soon be posted on the ITS website, noting that ‘passphrases' are a great way to protect your accounts.

"Passphrases are super easy to remember, especially if you make it something that is related to the thing you're logging into or something special that happened the day you made it.  I had trouble with a problem at work the day my password came do and ‘IthinkIcanIthinkIcan1' became my password.  One day we had a tornado warning, ‘!LookMa!Atornad0!' worked well for the time."

Fletcher then gave some final words to students about this period of change.

"This is all being done for security's sake, because we're all about protecting our campus.  I really appreciate all the patience students have been showing with this," Fletcher said. "I know it's a pain because once you have a good password in your head, you don't want to change it and it's a pain to update iPads and cell phones, but ultimately it's for everyone's protection and best interest."

Fletcher also added that once you do it online, immediately update it on your samrtphones or tablets, so that they won't try to connect with bad credentials.

For further information, contact Fletcher at dfletcher@astate.edu, or call (870) 972-3033.  You can contact Barnett at ebarnett@astate.edu.