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Whakatane District – June News

July 10 Meeting Our next General Meeting will be held at 1:30 pm at the Knox Hall, 83 Domain Road

on Tuesday, July 10. Our guest speaker for this meeting will be Pam Higson from Sport

Waikato, Pam will be giving a nominal thirty-minute presentation on Keeping on Your

Feet – a strength and balance programme aimed at us older adults. The presentation

will also include a practical component where a variety of very simple but effective

exercises that can be easily done at home to help build strength and balance will be

demonstrated, incorporating an opportunity for members to participate.

Zone Director

At the Grey Power Federation AGM in April, our then Zone Director, Mac Welch was

elected as Grey Power President; as a result, of myself being Deputy Zone Director, I

have taken on the position of Zone Director until the elections in November.

Brian Newton

May 7 - AGM

Our previous meeting was our AGM, held at the Knox Hall, the current committee were

re-elected, with one member offering to come along to the next committee meeting to

decide whether it is right for them, we certainly hope they decide to continue. Our

guest speaker for this meeting was Angelika Gillen from Age Concern. Angelika spoke

on SAYGO (Steady As You Go), and in particular on Falls Prevention.

After a brief presentation on what SAYGO was all about, Angelica had everyone

attending the meeting participating in some of the exercises in the program which she

has created; in addition, as the SAYGO group was meeting at the same time in the next

room; she invited members into the SAYGO class to watch a few of the exercises the

group were undertaking.

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A Cat Chills Out with God in Heaven A cat dies and goes to Heaven.

God meets him at the gate and says, "You have been a good cat all of these years. Anything you desire is yours, all you have to do is ask."

The cats says, "Well, I lived all my life with a poor family on a farm and had to sleep on hardwood floors."

God says, "Say no more." And instantly, a fluffy pillow appears.

A few days later, six mice are killed in a tragic accident and they go to Heaven.

God meets them at the gate with the same offer that He made the cat.

The mice said, "All our lives we've had to run. Cats, dogs and even women with brooms have chased us. If we could only have a pair of roller skates, we wouldn't have to run anymore."

God says, "Say no more." And instantly, each mouse is fitted with a beautiful pair of tiny roller skates.

About a week later, God decides to check and see how the cat is doing. The cat is sound asleep on his new pillow. God gently wakes him and asks, "How are you doing? Are you happy here?"

The cat yawns, stretches and says, "Oh, I've never been happier in my life. And those Meals on Wheels you've been sending over are the best!"

A diplomat is a man who always remembers a woman's birthday –

- but never her age.

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An Opinion on MMP Elections

Every major dictionary describes democracy as "the government of a country by its people, usually through a parliament of representatives elected by them" Check out the Oxford, Webster’s, Chambers even Heinemann New Zealand Dictionary, they are all the same.

There is NO mention of a political party having any right to say in who should be a representative in parliament. In a democracy that is up to the people. When some New Zealander's voted for Mixed Member Proportional (MMP), did they knowingly or unknowingly throw democracy out the door.

This was a democracy that so many had fought and died for, protecting our right and privilege as New Zealander's to democratically elect our government. However, with MMP do we now live in a party state? A state where political parties can place who they choose in positions of power. These are known as list MPs, who are NOT elected by the people, is this democracy?

The only other major economy to operate under MMP, is Germany, it was forced upon them at the end of WW2; however, in Germany it is the party who gains the most votes who chooses coalition partners, so still permitting the party whom the majority voted for to form the coalition government.

New Zealand has adopted a methodology where in effect one minor party chooses who will be in government, and in the last election, effectively one man made that choice, is this how democracy should operate?

The political polls show us (and they are usually reasonably accurate) that either of the so called main parties will require the backing of one or more minor parties to gain the Treasury Benches. This could effectively mean that one man would have the political clout to control New Zealand, is this not where we are now, and is this how democracy should work?

I would stress that the view expressed in this article is that of the author, it may or may not be the opinion of other members of the Whakatane District Grey Power Association committee.

Brian Newton

Light travels faster than sound. ---

This explains why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.

Albert Einstein

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Some “Darwin Awards” from years gone by

1). After stopping for drinks at an illegal bar, a Zimbabwean bus driver found that the 20 mental patients he was supposed to be transporting from Harare to Bulawayo had escaped. Not wanting to admit his incompetence, the driver went to a nearby bus stop and offered everyone waiting there a free ride. He then delivered the passengers to the mental hospital, telling the staff that the patients were very excitable and prone to bizarre fantasies. The deception wasn't discovered for three days.

2). An American teenager was in the hospital recovering from serious head

wounds received from an oncoming train. When asked how he received the injuries, the lad told police that he was simply trying to see how close he could get his head to a moving train before he was hit.

3). As a female shopper exited a New York convenience store, a man grabbed

her purse and ran. The clerk called 911 immediately, and the woman was

able to give them a detailed description of the snatcher. Within minutes,

the police apprehended the snatcher. They put him in the car and drove

back to the store. The thief was then taken out of the car and told to

stand there for a positive ID. To which he replied, "Yes, officer, that's

her. That's the lady I stole the purse from."

And Finally - A 5-STAR STUPIDITY AWARD WINNER!

When a man attempted to siphon gasoline from a motor home parked on a Seattle street, he got much more than he bargained for. Police arrived at the scene to find a very sick man curled up next to a motor home near spilled sewage. A police spokesman said that the man admitted to trying to steal gasoline and plugged his siphon hose into the motor home's sewage tank by mistake. The owner of the vehicle declined to press charges, saying that it was the best laugh he'd ever had.

“The handle on your recliner does not qualify as an exercise machine”

“But when I do remember your Birthday you say I’m Rubbing It In!”

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Grey Power Federation Database We reported, foolishly, in our April newsletter that together with Matamata association, we

were optimistic with regard to a positive outcome in respect of the above; sadly, this has

not materialised.

Bob Thompson and Brian Arndt from Matamata association together with myself attended

a meeting called by President, Mac Welch at the Grey Power Federation Office in Auckland.

We were under the misconception that the purpose was to look at the best way to

implement a new up to date membership database system.

However, from the outset of the meeting it became extremely apparent that the Federation

Office personnel who manage the existing system were vehemently opposed to any

progress on this front and that no new system would be implemented. It further became

abundantly clear that despite all the work we had put in and the fact that we received very

positive feedback from other associations, that to pursue the matter any further would

only prove to be futile, it would quite simply be too difficult to achieve with the current

Federation Office administration.

What did amaze us all was being informed that out of all seventy-three Grey Power

Associations in New Zealand, only four were using the database to manage their

memberships; if the current system is so good, then why are only four associations using

it? We have our own opinions on the reasons, all of which unsurprisingly revolve around

the Federation Office administration.

We really appreciate the high level of support we have received for this project from other

associations; however, at this time the reality is that with the current Federation Office

administration, there is simply too much resistance to the inevitable change that comes

with progress.

Brian Newton

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The Story of A “Loser”

This amazing story is an inspiration to everyone

When he was a little boy, his uncle called him sparky, after a comic strip horse named spark plug. School was all but impossible for Sparky. He failed every subject in eighth grade. He flunked Physics, Latin, Algebra and English in High School. His record in sports wasn’t any better. Although he did make the school’s golf team, He promptly lost the most important match of the season.

Oh, there was a consolation match, he lost that too. Throughout his life, Sparky was socially awkward, it wasn’t that the other students disliked him. Nobody really cared that much Sparky was a loser! He, his classmates, everyone knew it. So, he learned to live with it. He made up his mind that if things were meant to work, they would Otherwise he would content himself with what appeared to be his inescapable mediocrity. One thing was important to Sparky – Drawing, he was proud of his artwork In his senior year of high school, he submitted some cartoon to the yearbook His editors rejected the concept. Despite this brush off, Sparky was convinced of his ability. He even decided to become an artist. After finishing high school, Sparky wrote to Walt Disney Studios. They asked for samples of his artwork, despite careful preparation, it was also rejected. One more confirmation that he was a loser. But Sparky still didn’t give up Instead he decided to tell his own life story in cartoons.

The main character would be a little boy who symbolises the perpetual user and chronic underachiever, it was what he knew best. Sparky’s cartoon character went on to become a cultural phenomenon of all sorts. People readily identified with this “lovable loser” He reminded people of the painful and embossing moments from their own past, of their pain and shared humanity. The character soon became famous worldwide. That character was………

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“Charlie Brown” And Sparky, the boy whose many failures never kept him from trying, whose work was rejected again and again, is the highly successful cartoon artist;

“Charles Schultz” His cartoon strip, “Peanuts” continues to inspire books, “T” Shirts and Christmas Specials. Reminding us, as someone once commented, somehow life finds a way for all of us, even the losers.

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Definition of Calories:

Tiny creatures that live in your wardrobe and sew your clothes a little bit tighter every

night.

To err is human, to blame it on somebody else shows management potential.

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A recent experience with cellphones Towards the end of 2017, I bought my partner a fitness wrist band for measuring heart

rate, steps and pulse only to find that it would not work with the Android version

installed on her current cellphone. This meant purchasing a new cellphone which would

be compatible with the wrist band, our cellphone contracts are with 2 Degrees, so off

I went to look at what they had on offer. The excellent staff in the Whakatane store

advised me on an OPPO A73; however, it was my belief that any cellphone purchased

from them would be locked to their network, accordingly I purchased the same model

from PB Technologies in Tauranga at an identical price.

The phone required a new mini sim card, which of course meant a trip back to 2

Degrees, the new card was fitted with no hassles at all and the guy then asked me

where I bought it from, and when I told him, asked why I didn’t buy it from them. My

reply was because it would have been locked, to which he responded that 2 Degrees

hadn’t locked their handsets to their network for quite some time.

Had I known that, I would most definitely have purchased the phone from them! So, if

any member is looking to replace or upgrade their cellphone, remember, 2 Degrees do

not lock their handsets, which means if you go overseas, you can simply buy a local

sim card, thus avoiding the somewhat high cost associated with roaming charges.

Brian Newton

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Using I.T. Devices As we are sure the majority of our readers will be aware, we have been extolling the

benefits of being I.T. savvy since the current editors took over the newsletters, paying

your bills is so much more convenient using Internet Banking than having to pay over

the counter at a bank, and you may have noticed that companies and service providers

are actively discouraging receiving payments by cheque.

One of the prime reasons behind this is of course cost; banks charge a fee for clearing

cheques, so when you pay a bill by cheque, bare in mind that the amount written on

that cheque will incur a fee passed to the company or service provider. Our association

used to be exempt from this; however, not so any more, we are now charged $1.00

for every cheque paid in; this is the reason we ask for an additional $1.00 if payment

for subscriptions etc, are made by cheque.

Also, due to the high cost of using NZ Post, many companies and service providers will

only send out information electronically, and not use the post; we’re sure you will be

aware that banks will charge for mailing paper bank statements, but not for having

them delivered electronically.

There is also the aspect of keeping in touch with family and friends, many more people

do this either via social media or email; in fact, being realistic, the majority of younger

people will normally only use these media to keep in touch. Whilst on the subject of

Social Media; please ensure you have your privacy settings correctly set if you are using

Facebook or any other social media platform, especially given the recent fall out with

regard to Facebook.

If anyone is interested in becoming more I.T. literate, using Laptops, Android Tablets,

iPads, Smartphones or iphones; learning more about various Apps, Facebook etc, we

would strongly suggest you contact Senior Net, who run a wide variety of courses

covering a wide range of I.T. areas, the course fees and membership are also extremely

reasonable.

For further information on the courses run by Senior Net, and how to enrol for them

please contact Carolyn Jacobs on 07 308 5501, or if you have access to the internet,

simply click on the link below, the site provides information on the courses being run

this term, click on the “Calendar” page, plus a list of some of the others available.

Senior Net are also happy to organise one on one sessions for any specific

requirements.

http://seniornetwhakatane.nz/

You don’t need a parachute to skydive –-

-- you only need a parachute to skydive twice.

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Update on Funeral Insurance – Is It Worth It

I was trying to decide what to write about for this issue, when I received several calls

in a week from companies wanting to sell me funeral insurance. I was quite polite with

the first two or three, but after this it too long to get rid of them, so for the next I took

the initiative and asked them who was benefitting from the insurance premiums; i.e.

who were the shareholders? I didn’t manage to get any straight answers from any of

them.

I was left wondering why a supermarket and a department store, amongst others, had

gone into Funeral Insurance. I concluded that it must be very lucrative, and very

lucrative operations are not renowned for being great for consumers.

After all of this, I decided to resurrect the article that I wrote on Funeral Insurance

back in 2016.

I have updated the prices and added a couple of other items; so here is take two on

Funeral Insurance – Is It Worth It?

If you have suffered a recent bereavement, you could find this article upsetting. We do, however, feel this is a matter that needs to be brought to the attention of our members. I don’t know how you all feel, but I am absolutely fed up with fielding telephone calls from companies trying to sell me Funeral Insurance. If I could find out who is selling my information to these companies, I would stop dealing with them! (Do they know something about my D.O.D. that I don’t?) So, because of my annoyance, I decided to find out how much an average funeral costs, and how many years it would take me to save that amount at the weekly payment quoted by Funeral Insurance companies. One popular company advertises their insurance for as little as $2.00 per day, which equates to $28.00 per Super Payment, or well over $700.00 per year! At that rate if you live for more than 7 or 8 years, you are paying the insurance company. You would

be better off opening a separate bank savings account and putting the premiums into that. As you will probably be aware, Whakatane District Council, now allow people to be cremated, or buried, without using a funeral director. This will be a great saving for those wishing to organise the funeral of a loved one. Doing the organising yourself, contrary to what the ads tell you, can be very therapeutic. I was astounded when I started the research for this article to discover the extremely wide range of prices for essentially the same services. Below, I have given a list of things to consider when pricing a funeral, together with current costs for a cremation or burial in Whakatane. As you can appreciate, the cost for a cremation is (or should be) substantially less than a burial (interment).

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Matters involved in organising a funeral: Legal & Medical documentation Casket – can be purchased or hired Cremation or Burial Registering death & providing a death certificate Transport Optional Extras: Embalming: $500.00 - $600.00 Newspaper notices: $150.00 +

Flowers: $150.00 + Celebrant: $460.00 Minister: $250.00 Chapel Hire: Varies according to area (Gateway $150.00) Death Certificate: $ 33.00 Medical Referee: $ 45.00 (Cremation Only) Urn: $ 40.00 + Casket: $500.00 + In Whakatane the costs at the crematorium are: Adult: $550.00

$200.00 Surcharge for Saturdays & Public Holidays Chapel: Full Service - $125.00 Simple Committal - $ 75.00 A burial plot in the cemetery is currently $1.975.00, plus an interment and maintenance fee of $700.00, thus a total cost of $2,675.00. A plot for ashes is $154.00 plus a $167.50 maintenance fee, thus a total cost of

$321.50. What this means is that if you shop around, or even do it yourself, a simple cremation may cost nominally $2,000.00, excluding any transport. Adding embalming and a full chapel committal would add approximately a further $1,000.00. Even when you add all the optional extras it still comes in at under $5,000.00 – a long way short of the $8,000.00 to $10,000.00 as quoted in the media! Obviously, if you want your loved one to be buried in the cemetery, the costs will be higher, as you will need to purchase a plot; however, even with all the extras it still comes in under $9,000.00. It is worth noting that if the surviving partner’s income, is under $29,398.720 per annum, then MSD (WINZ) may pay up to $2,058.52 towards the funeral expenses. As a far superior alternative to Funeral Insurance.

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The Funeral Directors Association of New Zealand (FDANZ) operate a Funeral Trust, which is set up to enable the prepayment of funerals, a major benefit being that not only does the sum paid in accrue interest, you will not lose what you have paid in if you cease making payments; below are some of the features of the scheme:

• It’s not an Insurance Scheme • There are no requirements for a health check or any personal questions • Money is held in the FDANZ Funeral Trust

• Up to $10,000.00 in funeral pre-payment excluded from asset testing, when assessing eligibility for long term residential care subsidy

• Able to pay in lump sum or by installments • Initial Payment $200.00 via Automatic Payment

• Ongoing payments $20.00 via Automatic Payment – otherwise $500.00 per instalment

• No maximum amount

• Any surplus after Funeral Costs is returned to estate For further information on the above and regarding FDANZ come along to our September meeting, or if you are reading this online, click on the links below.

http://gatewayfuneral.co.nz/ http://fdanzfuneraltrust.co.nz/ Personally, I like the idea of mourners bringing flowers and food to share with others, as I feel this more truly celebrates the life of the deceased rather than everything being done, and you just turn up; especially if the flowers are from your own garden. I actually remember funerals like this in my childhood growing up in TeTeko. For those contemplating a DIY approach, www.diyfunerals.co.nz is an excellent site. Please note that all prices quoted are exclusive of GST.

Demystifying the Funeral Process I really appreciate the assistance and help given in updating this article by Bradley Shaw and Hemi Mooney of Gateway Funeral Services. Bradley will be our guest speaker at the September meeting, and has offered to organise an open day for Grey Power members at their premises to further demystify and elucidate upon the funeral process, and to answer any questions.

Susan Anderson

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Not All Thieves Are Stupid 1. Long - Term Parking:

Some people left their car in the long-term parking at the airport while away, and

someone broke into the car. Using the information on the car’s registration in the

glove compartment, they drove the car to the people’s home and robbed it. So, I

guess if we are going to leave the car in long-term parking, we should NOT leave

the registration/insurance documents in it, nor your remote garage door opener.

This gives us something to think about with all our new electronic technology.

2. GPS:

Someone had their car broken into while they

were at a football game. Their car was parked

on the green which was adjacent to the football

stadium and specially allotted to football fans.

Things stolen from the car included a garage

door remote control, some money and a GPS

which had been prominently mounted on the

dashboard. When the victims got home, they

found that their house had been ransacked and

just about everything worth anything had been

stolen. The thieves had used the GPS to guide

them to the house. They then used the garage

remote control to open the garage door and gain

entry to the house. The thieves knew the owners

were at the football game, they knew what time the game was scheduled to finish

and so they knew how much time they had to clean out the house. It would

appear that they had brought a truck to empty the house of its contents.

Something to consider if you have a GPS - don’t put your home address in it. Put

a nearby address (like a store or petrol station) so you can still find your way

home if you need to, but no one else would know where you live if your GPS were

stolen.

3. Cell Phones:

I never thought of this! This lady has now changed her habit of how she lists her

names on her cell phone after her handbag was stolen. Her handbag, which

contained her cell phone, credit card, wallet, etc, was stolen. Twenty minutes

later when she called her hubby, from a pay phone telling him what had

happened, hubby says, “I received your text asking about our Pin number and

I’ve replied a little while ago”. When they rushed down to the bank, the bank

staff told them all the money was already withdrawn.

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The thief had actually used the stolen cell phone to text “hubby” in the contact

list and got hold of the pin number. Within 20 minutes he had withdrawn all the

money from their bank account.

4. Purse in The Grocery Cart:

A lady went grocery-shopping at a local supermarket and left her purse sitting in

the children’s seat of the cart while she reached something off a shelf. You think

you know how the story goes, but please read on! Her wallet was stolen, and she

reported it to the store personnel. After returning home, she received a phone

call from the Mall Security to say that they had her wallet and that although there

was no money in it, it did still hold her personal papers. She immediately went to

pick up her wallet, only to be told by Mall Security that they had not called her.

By the time she returned home again, her house had been broken into and

burglarised. The thieves knew that by calling and saying they were Mall Security,

they could lure her out of her house long enough for them to burglarise it.

Moral Lesson:

A. Do not disclose the relationship between you and the people in your contact list.

Avoid using names like Home, Honey, Hubby, Sweetheart, Dad, Mom, etc.

B. And very importantly, when sensitive info is being asked through texts, CONFIRM

by calling back.

C. Also, when you’re being texted by friends or family to meet them somewhere,

be sure to call back to confirm that the message came from them. If you don’t

reach them, be very careful about going places to meet “family and friends” who

text you.

Life is like a jar of jalapeño peppers. What you do today may be a burning issue tomorrow.

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Some Interesting Facts on New Zealand

• There is a law that states every high school in New Zealand may hold one pound of uranium and one pound of thorium, for conducting nuclear experiments, and that it will be fined $1,000,000 in the case of a nuclear explosion.

• In an attempt to attract publicity, Badminton New Zealand chose “Black Cocks” as a

nickname for their national teams in 2004.

• The logo of the Royal New Zealand Air Force is the kiwi, Ironically a flightless bird.

• There is a clock in New Zealand that has been running since 1864 despite never having been manually wound.

• The filming of the Lord of the Rings trilogy pumped roughly $200,000,000 into the New

Zealand economy.

• A dolphin named Pelorus Jack regularly guided ships in New Zealand through treacherous waters until his disappearance in 1912.

• New Zealand has more Scottish pipe bands per capita than Scotland itself

• New Zealand is home to more species of penguin than anywhere else in the world.

• New Zealand has won more Olympic gold medals per capita head than any other

country.

• The longest blackout in the world was on February 19, 1998, when the four main power cables supplying Auckland city, broke down. The disruption, which lasted 66 days, affected 7500 business and residential customers and cost businesses an estimated $300 million.

• Wellington, New Zealand, is the southernmost national capital in the world at latitude

41.2° South.

From our family to yours, with Dignity. Proudly Supporting Grey Power in the

Eastern Bay

Contact (07) 308 6102 for more information

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7 Great Password Tips

Password safety - you've heard it all before and you're probably tired of hearing about it, but it's something that we cannot emphasize enough: creating a weak password is like leaving all of your doors unlocked. Just because you have never been robbed before doesn't mean that it's safe to leave your doors unlocked, does it? It only takes that one time for you to lose everything, and the same is true for your email accounts, bank accounts, and whatever other valuable accounts that you possess. Nobody wants to try to remember 20 unique passwords for 20 different accounts, and that is why many of us decide to reuse the same password across multiple sites.

However, although this is very convenient, it can backfire spectacularly. If a cybercriminal gets access to one of your accounts, they automatically have access to all of your accounts. Therefore, with cybercrime getting more and more common, having a different password for each account is absolutely essential.

Maybe one day, with our ever-increasing technology, we'll move beyond passwords and usernames, but for the time being, it's absolutely critical to strengthen your weak passwords. It takes little effort on your part, and trust us, you don't want to be the one who loses everything only to realize that all of your problems could've been prevented with just a few simple tweaks.

The Worst Passwords of 2015 It's not easy to determine the "worst" passwords being used as passwords are kept hidden and secret. However, in 2016 a company called SplashData went to the bother of tallying up over 2 million leaked passwords from 2015, evaluated them, and compiled them into a ranking of "Worst Passwords of 2015". Below are the worst 15:

1. 123456 2. password 3. 12345678 4. qwerty

5. 12345 6. 123456789 7. football 8. 1234

9. 1234567 10. baseball 11. welcomes 12. 1234567890

13. abc123 14. 111111 15. 1qaz2wsx

As you can see, these really are bad. If you have one of the aforementioned passwords, you might as well not have a password at all. A hacker would have a field day with your accounts if you have passwords this simple. Also, if you think that your password is safe because it doesn't appear on that list, you'd best think again.

These passwords are extremely bad because they all have the same characteristics of easily-hacked passwords, and it's possible that your own password does too.

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So, let us take a look at what makes these passwords terrible and what you can do to ensure that all your accounts are safe.

1. The Obvious Password Seven of the worst offenders in the list above are all slight variations of the same basic password: consecutive numbers. People use this type of password because it is easy to remember and super easy to type - which is why qwerty is also on the list. But, your password isn't meant to be easy! Using obvious consecutive number passwords - one that took you seconds to come up with - is just asking for trouble. In fact, many cybercriminals have access to automated hacking programs that try these common number passwords in order to hack into your accounts.

2. The Default Password It's astounding that "password" is used as often as it is. This is the default password for most devices, but it's expected that the user will change it to something secure. However, it seems that a lot of people are lazy and either refuse or forget to change it. Therefore, if you have kept the default password as it is, it would take no effort for a hacker to break into your account and help themselves to whatever they want.

Here's some advice: if you get a new device or account and you get given a default username and password - such as admin/password or admin/admin - do yourself a huge favour and change it immediately.

3. The Short Password Length is important when it comes down to password size. Every extra character - be it a letter, number or symbol - expands the possibility space and makes your password harder to crack. Therefore, nothing is worse than a short password, and this is made evident when you take a look at the list of rubbish passwords - only 2 of them have more than 8 characters, and 8 is even too short nowadays for real protection.

So, make your password longer! Yes, longer than what you've got already! If you're wondering whether your password is long enough...it probably isn't. Chuck on a couple of extra characters at the end.

4. The "No Numbers or Symbols" Password Generally speaking; a longer password consisting of only letters is better than a shorter password with letters, symbols, and numbers. However, longer passwords that incorporate letters, numbers, and symbols are even better.

The reason behind this is that you want to maximize the number of possible choices for every single character in your password. If you have only used letters, that's 26 possible choices per character while if you use numbers, symbols, and letters, that's 46 possible choices per character - this difference has an exponential impact.

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5. The "L33T SP34K" Password If you're thinking about using symbols and numbers in your password, there is one caveat you should be aware of: if your password has complete words, don't make simple letter-to-number or letter-to-symbol substitutions for individual characters.

For example, in cableCABLE, don't replace the a with @, the l with 1, the A with 4 or the E with 3. You might believe that c@b1eC4BL3 is a great password that is stronger than the original, but there's a very high chance that is actually isn't.

Cybercriminals know all the tricks in the book, so if one is trying to hack into your accounts, they're going to try these substitutions anyway.

6. The "Personal Information" Password Whenever you're trying to come up with a new password, we must stress that you should never ever use any personal information. A great password should have no relation to you at all.

For example, a lot of people like football and baseball, both of which can be seen on the list above. If you're a big fan of either sport, it would be pretty trivial to guess.

Nowadays, thanks to social media profiles, personal details are available at the click of a finger, and this kind of access makes it a lot easier for hackers to guess weak passwords.

7. The Pattern Password A lot of people tend to memorize their passwords by using muscle memory, so whenever they need to come up with a new password for a new account, it's always tempting for them to rely on some kind of keyboard pattern. There's absolutely nothing wrong with this as long as you do it properly. After all, muscle memory is an effective way to memorize long passwords that are otherwise nonsensical. However, please never resort to over simplistic patterns such as 1qaz2wsx, qwerty, or qwertyuiop.

So, What Makes a Good Password?

You should have a good idea as to what makes a good password by now; but read the following criteria just to make extra sure - it won't do you any harm.

• It should be at least 8 characters long. • It should contain special characters such as #,@,$,%, & and/or numbers. • It shouldn't contain words found in the dictionary. • It should use a variation of upper and lower case letters. • It must not contain personal information such as your date of birth, phone

number, spouse's name, pet's name, kid's name, or login name.

18

President: Betty Hudson 027 235 0459 whatarau61@gmail.com

Secretary: Susan Anderson 021 116 9115 susananderson46@gmail.com

Treasurer: Brian Newton 07 307 7410 whakatanegreypower@gmail.com

Membership

Secetary: Kate Ross 021 147 2758 kivrin52@gmail.com

Committee: Maud McKinnon 07 308 0358

Rob Ross 07 307 0374

Siva Panadam 027 280 7122

Mailing Address: PO Box 830, Whakatane, 3158

email Address: whakatanegreypower@gmail.com

Website: http://greypowerwhakatane.org.nz

http://greypowerwhakatane.org.nz/whakatane/membership/renew-membership/

Disclaimer:

Opinions expressed in this news issue are those of the contributors. All information is given in good faith and is believed to be accurate and reliable at the time of issue; however, Whakatane District Grey Power Association Inc. does not accept any liability for its contents.

Prepared & Edited by: Susan Anderson & Brian Newton