Why do so many companies and people say that your password has to be so long and complicated, just to have restrictions?

I am in the process of changing some passwords (I have peen pwnd and it’s the password I use for use-less-er sites) and suddenly they say “password may contain a maximum of 15 characters“… I mean, 15 is long but it’s nothing for a password manager.

And then there’s the problem with special characters like äàáâæãåā ñ ī o ė ß ÿ ç just to name a few, or some even won’t let you type a [space] in them. Why is that? Is it bad programming? Or just a symptom of copy-pasta?

  • @owsei
    link
    11 year ago

    How “a$$word” saved PayPal

    TL;DR: PayPal had reencrypted their database with a new encryption scheme, but it would accidentally cutout passwords larger than 8 characters. However one person in set their passphrase to “a$$word”, saving the day.