Seven Password Best Practices For Retailers

No one likes to use passwords, but they are critical to securing access to systems with valuable business data. Retailers, like any other business, should require passwords as part of their security policies to protect POS systems, backroom applications, customer databases, and any other business system.

Whether employees work at the POS, the warehouse, the finance department or on the road connecting to the network through VPN, everyone should follow the password policy to minimize the chance of a cyber-attack or accidental data leak.

The following are seven password best practices every retailer should implement:

1. Require strong passwords or passphrases

   Simple passwords are easy to crack, which is why they should include upper and lowercase letters, numbers and symbols. But such combinations are easy to forget, so consider requiring passphrases that employees are more likely to remember. A nonsensical word combination such as grasstiremeet will stick to the user’s mind while being hard to crack.