New Research Graphical passwords an antidote to 'shoulder surfing' Archived article from Jan 23, 2006 By Jen Miller   How safe is your online information? Not nearly safe enough, due to the secrecy of personal passwords being easily compromised by hackers and “shoulder surfers.” Forget about words and numbers as passwords and use images instead, says a team of Camden researchers. Camille Birget, a professor of computer science, and his colleagues have developed a graphical password system in which users select areas of a picture, called “click points,” rather than numbers and letters. The pictures must be complex, like a landscape or cityscape, with many click points to make the system secure. A three-grid system allows users to click in a range of the original choice. “Users never see the grid – it’s all in the computer,” says Birget, whose team also developed a system that would help prevent “shoulder surfing” – password theft through surreptitious monitoring. “There are cameras everywhere,” Birget says, “and you never know who could be looking over your shoulder, even in your office.” As part of the study team, Leonardo Sobrado, then an undergraduate, applied graphical password principles to develop a system that resembles a video game. Users pick 10 icons, which are scrambled with 200 others. To gain entry, the users employ shapes, such as triangles. “The drawback is that more time is required for users to enter the system than with a typed password,” Birget says. On the plus side, he believes that the icon system could be developed into a video game that would be fun to play. “Some of our researchers’ children tested the system and they loved to play it as a game,” he says. The system is available at clam.rutgers.edu/~lsobrado/graphicalpassword. Return to the Jan 23, 2006 issue

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