I wrote an article on my security website, http://www.zone260.com, about strong passwords. You may have come across this recently, where a website is asking you to generate a password that's at least 6 characters long, has numbers, blah blah blah. At least some sites have the cool secure meter that shows you how strong your password is.

But let's face it, coming up with a strong password with all those funny characters isn't exactly easy. Nor is it easy to remember the passwords once you come up with them.

In essence, a few tricks you can use to come up with a strong password are:

• Start with the word of your choice. Perhaps it's the simple password you have now, maybe apple.
• Phrase the word so it's no longer something you find in the dictionary, but easy to remember... rottonapple, for example.
• Now, capitalize one of the characters. Try rottonApple.
• Now, find a few characters you can replace with numbers or other symbols that look the same. So, take the first "o" and make it a zero, and take the e at the end and make it a 3. This becomes r0ttonAppl3.

And there you have it. A r0ttonAppl3. A pretty secure password you can easily remember!

There are some other considerations you should know of when creating and using new passwords online. Please read the full article at http://www.zone260.com/how-to-create-a-strong-password-you-can-remember if you'd like more info.