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💡 The big idea

Most passwords are too short and too easy to guess. But a password that's hard to crack is also usually hard to remember — unless you know this trick: use a silly sentence.

The passphrase method: Think of a silly sentence. Take the first letter (or first few letters) of each word, add a number and a symbol, and you have a password that's long, strong, and yours to remember.

🔧 How it works

1
Think of a silly sentence. The sillier, the better — silly things are easier to remember.
"My cat ate 8 purple socks!"
2
Use the first letter of each word. Capitalise some of them.
Mca8Ps!
3
Or use the first few letters of each word to make it even longer.
MyCat8PurpleSocks!
4
You now have a password with uppercase letters, lowercase letters, a number, and a symbol. 18 characters. Hard to crack, easy to remember.

Why longer is so much stronger

Password Characters Approx. time to crack
password 8 Instantly
P@ssw0rd 8 A few minutes
MyCat8PurpleSocks! 18 Millions of years

Times are approximate and based on standard brute-force attack estimates. The key point: length beats complexity every time.

📋 The four rules

📏
At least 12 characters. The longer the better. Silly sentences naturally give you this.
🔀
Mix it up. Uppercase + lowercase + at least one number + at least one symbol (!@#$...).
🚫
No personal info. Not your name, birthday, pet's name, or address — those are easy to guess.
🔑
Different for every account. One password stolen = only one account at risk, not all of them.

✏️ Make one together

Your turn

  1. Think of a silly sentence — something that makes you laugh or that's easy to picture. Write it down (on paper, not on screen).
  2. Turn it into a passphrase using the first letters or first few letters of each word.
  3. Add a capital letter, a number, and a symbol (! or @ or # or $).
  4. Check it against the four rules. Does it pass all four?

✅ Caregiver check

  • Is it 12 or more characters long?
  • Does it have at least one uppercase letter?
  • Does it have at least one number?
  • Does it have at least one symbol?
  • Does it avoid personal information (name, birthday, pet's name)?
Write it down — just for now. Until you've memorised it, it's okay to write the passphrase (not the actual password) on paper and store it somewhere private at home. Do not store the password itself in an email, text message, or note on your device.

🌱 Signs it's working

You're now ready for the next step: a password manager — one secure place to store all your passwords so you only need to remember one strong passphrase. That's a separate DCC activity when you're ready.
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Ages 10–12 version of this activity
Older children can complete this activity independently with a caregiver check-in.