Computer Networking Security: Account Naming and Password Security

This assignment delves into the crucial aspects of computer networking security, providing a detailed examination of account naming conventions, password length and complexity, and password expiration policies. It explores the importance of unique user accounts and effective naming strategies. The assignment also emphasizes the significance of strong password policies, including length, character complexity, and regular expiration, to mitigate security risks. Furthermore, it addresses the role of server administrative access, including the necessity for least privilege access and the protection of administrative credentials. The document also covers local and Windows domain account configurations, highlighting the implementation of domain password policies to enhance security. This assignment is designed to provide a comprehensive understanding of the security measures essential for protecting computer networks.

Running head: COMPUTER NETWORKING SECURITY
COMPUTER NETWORKING SECURITY
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note:

1COMPUTER NETWORKING SECURITY
Table of Contents
Account Naming Convention..............................................................................................2
Password Length and Complexity.......................................................................................2
Length..............................................................................................................................2
Complexity......................................................................................................................3
Expiration........................................................................................................................4
Server administrative access................................................................................................4
Local and windows domain account....................................................................................4

2COMPUTER NETWORKING SECURITY
Account Naming Convention
In naming convention, user account needs to be unique in nature so that it can have
naming convention. This particular step will make the job of the administrator much easier. One
of the best naming convention is the size of organization and its needs. There are three things
which should be taken into account like legacy application with eight-character limit, security,
and single sign-in other system. Some of the legacy application will allow only eight-character
for the username. Naming convention have been discussed below like
Complete first name and last name: It is known to be common naming convention
which is used by people. User can make use of first name and combination with the last name.
There is need for hyphen which needs to be added.
Ex- Joe smith login name will be Andrew.smith if there is any case of duplicate there is
need for adding middle name to this Andrew.c.smith.
This name is found to be beneficial as it help in easy creation of login names. It complete
works good for both small and large firm. There is only drawback of this particular method is
that it can build names which has more than 8 characters.
Password Length and Complexity
Length
Length of the password is considered to be as one of the vital aspects. Considering the
brute approach, longer password length requires much more time in analyzing it. Taking account
the organization viewpoint, there is a need for enforcing password of minimum length. It merely
ensures the point that all the employees in the organization are completely forced to create a

3COMPUTER NETWORKING SECURITY
suitable password that is large in size. If the length of the password is increased from 4 to 12,
then the value of combination and permutation is increased to around 200 billion times.
Complexity
Password complexity is completely highlighted by various kind of different characters in
password. It is very inclusive of some steps like
 Upper Case
 Lower Case
 Some special characters
 Number
Administrator which is a part of organization policy can have password which comprises
of certain characters like
 Password requires a minimum one an alphabet which is upper case.
 Password should have characters like “@”, “#”,”%”.
 Password needs to have a single numerical digit in it.
Apart from the rules, administrator can make some additional rule for enhancing the
complexity
 User first and last name should not be included in the password
 Name of the organization should be there in password.
 There is need for blacklisting the common words which can easily guessed.

4COMPUTER NETWORKING SECURITY
Expiration
Common practices of IT security team of firm is that best practices of password which
have some common interval. This is the one of the best practices which are followed by most of
the firm. The chosen standard of days is 30/45 where the age of password and user can make
changes in password at end of stated period.
The basic rule is that if the hacker gets the password through any means, then user can
change it. There is an assumption that hacker does not make of password at immediate basis.
Server administrative access
Administrative access completely refers to account that has the ability to make
modification in system hardware. Person along with administrative access to hardware and
software needs to have some special trust and additional responsibilities.
Yes administrator needs to make certain changes in default windows and Linux server
administrator account and password. There is need for enforcing some least privileges access.
There is need for ensuring the point that user has minimum privileges for job.
One of the basic standard is complete prohibition of sharing the password on global
platform. One of the main purpose is to protect other employees from any kind of inappropriate
suspicion.
Local and windows domain account
Yes the workstation needs to be attached to windows domain. No, the user does not
complete access the things needed in workstation.

5COMPUTER NETWORKING SECURITY
No, for providing protection to user account in directory domain, it is the duty of
administrator for configuration and implementation of domain password policy. This merely
provides over the complexity and password length along with frequency of changing user and
service account password. It has become very much tough for hacker to crack the password of
user by making use of force attack. In this, the password is captured and send over the network.
There is need for implementing some password policies like
Maximum age of password: Need to set up the password expiry in number of days. After
the expiry of password, the system will look for changing the password.
Minimum age of password: There is need for adjusting the point that how often user can
change password. The setting does not allow the user to make changes in the password but even
helps in getting the old password.