Wednesday, September 12, 2007

Patterned Keystrokes


It is believed keeping different password for all our logins in internet banking, social networking, mails and blog is safer. We need password to login into our own computer. This requires us to remember passwords for every login we make during the day.

Daily we reach office and login into the computer flawlessly. Again we login into our mailbox with a different password. But if someday we need to write our password on a piece of paper or save it in some other medium like mobile for our reference, we tend to forget the password.

What is it that makes us type flawlessly the password on a keyboard? Is it that we remember or it's the pattern of the keystroke that we remember while logging into the system or any net banking site. Remembering a password requires our brain activity while remembering our keystrokes is also a part of the brain activity.

There is always less effort required to repeat any activity at a given time. Like brushing our teeth is a natural process we are habituated after we get up from a long sleep. Hence we can brush our teeth even while we are half asleep on the sofa and we know how to stroke the brush and clean our teeth at times.

The same way we start typing password using positioning of the keys on the keyboards. Everything is registered in the brain. The day we are away for a while on a vacation for some days without having access to PC we struggle with the keyboard to get the password.

Now this is not the case with every one as everyone has his own style of remembering things. But the day I understood that there are people around me with similar characteristics, I couldn't stop myself writing this post.

So the next time you type password, think if you are actually remembering the password or just recollecting the pattern of keystrokes…

5 comments:

Jolvin Rodrigues said...

Its true for phone numbers as well - before ofcourse people got used to stored numbers...it becomes like reflex action.

Try this - Sometimes on a flawless typing spree, a thought of being flawless sometimes makes one search for keys on the keyboard.

Cedric Dias said...

interesting article n very true indeed

Prashant Karkera said...

#Jolvin: Thats true, Sometimes we fumble with the keys...

#Cedric: Thks...yeah

phish said...

yup a pattern it is :)

Prashant Karkera said...

#phish: Welcome to Whisper
Glad that u agree :)