Security questions - those annoying online things

Can I just say how much I hate these things so much?

My mom's maiden name I can do. "Favorite TV show of my youth" I cannot. Could be "Dukes of Hazzard." maybe "Family Ties" or "Battlestar Galactica." Or "Mad Men." Which childhood are we talking?

I'm trying to get into one of my accounts and I am reminded again how much I hate this guessing game. I can tell you my maternal grandmother's middle name for sure, and the street I grew up on, but my mom's latest occupation ... gee, when did I establish this account? What was she doing then?

Really, I appreciate what they're trying to do, but I'm in hate right now with ING because I had to reset my account. Tried to re-do the questions and guess what? I am unable to answer most of them, and I need to pick five new ones.

Well, I'm not married and have no children. That eliminates things like "hospital where your first child was born"' and "honeymoon spot." There were a total of four that only related to married, parental-type people. Four, five other choices, most prefaced with "favorite" and those are subjective. My favorite vacation spot? About five spring pop into my head -- what frame of mind was I in when I selected it? (And did I capitalize the "M" in Morocco, or did I do with pei?)

I had to do a QEP for the my federal security clearance and that was awesome. You get to write your own. "What is Leanne's husband's first and last name?" That I can do.

Sorry. Just had to vent.

 

I hate the things that ask you to enter the random collection of letters in fucked up print. I can rarely read them.

 

I always just try to stick to the basic ones: Name of first pet; Where were you born; What team do you like to see lose. Those 3 never change for me.

 

My answer is the same for every single one:

YourCompanySucks

 

I often choose, "Which beautiful celebrity does MisterCreosote's wife look like?" Woe is us, brother.

 

For a while, newspaper websites went on a kick where they required your gender, zip code and year of birth. I may have accelerated the decline of the industry by causing them to target women from Beverly Hills born in 1901.

 

Same here. They must have been pleased with their readership from zip code 90210.

 

When I'd get these, I'd give really obscure answers, or answers that were in no way related to the question.
Q: What's your favorite movie?
A: Razorback (a bad 1980s cable movie I saw listed on the guide the night I signed up for whatever it was)

Q: What was your first pet's name?
A: Five

Q: What's your mother's middle name?
A: San Antonio

My stupid thinking was, if somebody were trying to hack my passwords they'd get the answers wrong and be thwarted in their dastardly schemes. Of course what actually happened was, I'd forget my stupid answers and thwart myself when it came time to get into my account.
Amazingly, I was stone cold sober when I concocted this scheme.

 

I guess I have never thought about this...who gives a shit what you write in the line...just pick a word and stick to it.

Brilliant!

 

And that word is ... ThreeOctaveFart.

Hey, it's virtually foolproof.

 

That stuff drives me batty. That and the password carousel most companies have now, where you have to change your passwords every 90 days or so. System at my last shop was particularly heinous in that every little system required its own password (one to log in to the network, another for email, another for the CMS, etc.). It's how I ended up with all my work passwords being various permutations of "fuck you."

 

It drives me nuts if you have to add a capital letter or a special character. Then I'm fucked. Not because I don't remember my password, but because I don't remember that I was supposed to add a special character or capital letter.