Please be cautious about classified ads - We have had two longstanding member accounts compromised recently

[Bruce]

In both instances a nefarious actor has had the user's email address and password. Likely due to that combination being used on another website that was hacked.

Please watch for any payment requests to PayPal or other payment services that can not be clearly connected to the member. If the deal looks to good to be true it likely is.

If you have concerns please reach out to an Admin or Moderator. We would be happy to look for changes in account usage.

I have installed an addon that will check account passwords against Have I Been Pwned: Pwned Passwords . Hopefully we will identify additional accounts with compromised passwords before they are used against our members.

 

[Luc Lafreniere]

If I may add, reusing usernames and passwords on sites can be solved by using a reputable password manager. There are many paid and free options. If someone isn't sure how they work or if they can trust them, go and read up on them. They can really help in many ways including having a unique password for every single site since you don't need to remember them. If an account is compromised somewhere, that password is only used on that one site. There are many other benefits as well.

 

[VitaminSea]

Thank you staff for your diligence!

 

[Julian]

If I may add, reusing usernames and passwords on sites can be solved by using a reputable password manager. There are many paid and free options. If someone isn't sure how they work or if they can trust them, go and read up on them. They can really help in many ways including having a unique password for every single site since you don't need to remember them. If an account is compromised somewhere, that password is only used on that one site. There are many other benefits as well.

THIS!

I use 1Password. Not saying it is the best, but it works most of the time (by that I mean I can have it seamlessly fill in username and pw on most sites on a PC - it works on phone apps too, but that is less robust). When it doesn't work - all you have to do is either launch the app on your phone to copy paste it, or click on the extension on the menu bar. You can share PWs across people in the family (or not).

I use the app to create massive stong (different) passwords for all my sites - ESPECIALLY anything that holds financial information!

 

[Luc Lafreniere]

For those looking at products, some of the decent ones include

Lastpass: #1 Password Manager & Vault App with Single-Sign On & MFA Solutions | LastPass

BitWarden:

https://bitwarden.com/

Keepass:

KeePass Password Safe

KeePass is a free open source password manager. Passwords can be stored in an encrypted database, which can be unlocked with one master key.

keepass.info

and the same one as Julian mentioned, 1Password: Password Manager for Families, Businesses, Teams | 1Password

Personally, I now use BitWarden after many years of using LastPass. LastPass is probably one of the bigger ones as to the number of users. Have a look at all of them (and probably others). See what they offer and compare for your own personal situation.

Literally any of these will be WAY safer AND way more convenient (once you learn how to use them) than the alternatives. No password manager is perfect. But they are all better than writing things down, using the same stuff over and over, etc.