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Overly encrypted
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___This is the story of why I have to use a lock with a key at the gym.
___ It has nothing to do with enjoying having to keep up with a key or even with feeling more secure. Instead, it has everything to do with a terrible trouble afflicting modern Americans--number overload.
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MARK WINGFIELD
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___ The gym locker is one of the few remaining places where I can exercise a bit of personal preference and give my overdrawn brain cells a break. The sad truth is that I don’t think I can remember one more number or password or PIN or user name. I’ve already woven a tangled web that has left me as the only one deceived.
___ I simply can’t remember what password or personal identification number I’ve used where. And that sort of defeats the purpose of having these modern security devices, doesn’t it?
___ This problem came to a full head about a year ago, when I logged on to a major airline’s website to redeem a frequent flier coupon and was asked to enter a user name and password if I had one. I didn’t even remember that I had one, but the computer did.
___ Then ensued a lengthy guessing game as I tried out different passwords in vain attempts to get to the next screen. I tried all my usual standbys, and nothing worked. I must have signed up for this password at some moment of creative surge that yielded a brilliant but not memorable code.
___ I soon learned that after five futile attempts, they suspect you’re a hacker and lock you out. It would have been easier to file a tax return than to endure what I had to do to retrieve that lost password and end the lock-out.
___ Which brings us back to why I use a lock with a key at the gym. It’s one thing to be locked out of an airline’s website because you can’t remember your password, but it’s an entirely more urgent thing to be locked away from your clothes.
Mark Wingfield is managing editor of the Standard. Alison Wingfield is a freelance writer. The Wingfields moved to Texas from Louisville, Ky., where Mark had been editor of the Western Recorder, in which this column appeared weekly.
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___Just when I was getting over my nervousness about ordering online, I’ve come up against the most unnerving part of the whole process. Passwords.
___ Sure, it’s supposed to make you feel more secure. And I don’t want anyone stealing my name and address and stiffing me for the bill
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ALISON WINGFIELD
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on something I didn’t order. But enough is enough. If I have to remember or come up with another password, I’m going to scream.
___ Every time I come up with one, they throw me a curve, such as six characters, when my old standby is only four characters long. Or when I think I’ve got that down, they want a combination of letters and numbers. What do they think I am--a computer? And then there’s the problem of if Mark already was on a particular website and I don’t know what password he used. Since we’ve never gone to the trouble to get a second e-mail site, I’m stuck with his password, which inevitably he can’t remember.
___ Of course, this doesn’t surprise me, since Mark can’t even remember my Social Security number. I remember his. I guess that shows who fills out most of the forms in this household.
___ It’s amazing how many numbers I do still retain in this old brain. The other day, I was canceling an Internet service we had begun where we lived three houses ago. When I called to cancel, she asked for my address. I knew they might not have my newer Texas address, so I began to give her my last Kentucky address. When she said that wasn’t it, I thought hard, and blurted out the old, old address and got it right. She was amazed, and so was I.
___ Learning new numbers is one of the hardest parts of moving. And Dallas has added that lovely twist of a 10-digit phone number. Between new home and office phone numbers, a cell phone number (which I still haven’t learned), addresses, debit card PINs, license plate numbers and driver’s license numbers, a person could go crazy.
___ This makes it all the more amazing that no matter how many numbers are running around in our heads, God knows the number of hairs on our heads. God knows each of us by name. Now that’s a heavenly password we can always count on.
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