Two hours after sending an email on a pit thread, arguing with a guy who though it was fine to steal from a company (rental car) as long as they were insured, I awoke at 2 AM to find a burglar in my bedroom. Reverse karma, I don’t know. After chasing him out of my house, I found that he had indeed stolen my lap top.
My question: In the laptop was an Excel file with many passwords for accounts, web sites and the like. And while I know I have to cancel credit cards, change passwords, does the fact that the Excel file was password protected give me any protection? Or can this be opened by a computer geek in five minutes.
I could open it within 5 minutes. If you are really parnoid try out Trucrypt its free and open source and I have used it for many things I want to protect [porn]
Was the file on your desktop labeled “ALL MY PERSONAL ACCOUNT INFO” or in some random location with a random file name. Chances are it was some petty thieft who will sell it for whatever he can.
What version? Supposedly 2007’s format was tightened up. He can bruteforce the password if its weak, but if youre using the new version you might be okay. Or at least okay long enough to have time to change passwords and such.
If it was compatible with 97/2000/2003 then it uses the old method which has known vulnerabilities.
I have a desktop PC in my house, which is (slightly) more difficult to quickly steal than a laptop. In my paranoia, I still keep my password spreadsheet on a CD stored separately, with no copy on the PC’s HD. I guess I will continue to do so.
as Chris suggests, I chose not to name it “ALL MY PERSONAL ACCOUNT INFO,” but something more nondescript so as to not draw attention in the unlikely event that the CD is found by a miscreant.
That’s a pretty creepy experience. I was burglarized once and was freaked out for weeks, and I wasn’t even home when it happened. Hope you’re doing OK.
In all likelihood, your run-of-the-mill home invader isn’t also going to specialize in identify theft and password cracking. Chances are he’ll try to unload the laptop as soon as possible (so keep an eye on out eBay for “great laptop deals”). Also, may I recommend Lojack for your next laptop?
If you have Excel 2003 or better and have chosen a good password (non dictionary word, number & letters and preferably mixed case with punctuation) then you’re pretty safe.
In Office 2003 they went with real encryption and stopped storing the key with the file.