[Douglas Basford]

Hi all,

Maybe you've seen it: some researchers at USC have argued that iambic tetrameter passwords are not only easy to remember due to their rhythmic character but also practically unbreakable. They have a computer generating couplets that could do well, and suggest that humans would be better off coming up with their own, as a randomizing algorithm could be cracked by another algorithm. So here's our challenge to you: send us your passwords! No, really. Below are supposedly computer-generated passwords. Humans--let's outdo 'em! Post your best unguessable iambic tetrameter rhymed couplet passwords to #iambsafe via Facebook or Twitter, or if you prefer email them to editor@unsplendid.com. We'll consider the best of the best for publication in the upcoming issue of Unsplendid! Deadline: Nov. 18! We're hoping to make this a regular sort of thing...

Cheers,
Doug

Sophisticated potentates
misrepresenting Emirates
___________

The shirley emmy plebiscite
complete suppressed unlike invite
___________

Incited coolly nationwide
and also shipping countryside
___________

Imperial recruit complain
the diamonds area remain
___________

The lurid marginal dismay
or pleasure stealing anyway

See:
http://www.businessinsider.com/resea...poetry-2015-10
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...y-to-remember/

[Esther Murer]

I'll see what I can do about it, Doug, but it would take some ingenuity with some sites that require numbers & more.

[Douglas Basford]

Hi Esther,

However it is you want to go with it! The only rule: iambic tetrameter rhyming couplet...

All best,
D

[Douglas Basford]

a little bump up!

[W.F. Lantry]

When's the deadline again?

[Roger Slater]

I saw that article, but I couldn't quite understand the premise. Obviously it doesn't matter if the password rhymes or is metrical, except as a memory aid, but surely there are equally long prose phrases that are easy to memorize. Something mundane like "Yesterday I left my keys on the dining room table" should be just as strong a password and not at all difficult to memorize, no?*

Esther, you can just come up with your couplet and routinely add, say, the number 9 at the end. And for sites that require at least one capital letter, you can routinely start your couplet with a capital letter.

*I tested this password here and confirm that it is 100% safe. Using that site to experiment, I found that the use of at least one capital letter makes a wide variety of phrases into perfect passwords. And if you slap a single number on the end, you can use notably shorter phrases to achieve that result.

[Brian Allgar]

Originally Posted by Roger Slater

You can just come up with your couplet and routinely add, say, the number 9 at the end. And for sites that require at least one capital letter, you can routinely start your couplet with a capital letter.

Or you can build the capital letters and numbers into the couplet:

In 1756, the birth
of Mozart, wonder of the earth.

[Roger Slater]

Brian, if you stop with "birth" in your example, the site I linked to gives the password a 100% security rating. To me this suggests one can use the couplets as a mnemonic device, but for simplicity sake it's often only necessary to use the first line of the couplet.

[Esther Murer]

Yes, I agree that a whole couplet is much too long. But we can play the game.... I came up with a five-letter word which, rendered in html, reads as a rhymed IT couplet.