One of my major websites was hacked. Do you know how much trouble that can cause? So just in case you have not changed your password lately, or have not updated WordPress, continue reading to become inspired to do so.

In some ways it is like having your house robbed at night while you are sleeping. You wake up and things are missing or changed. Yet you had no idea there was a problem until it was too late. The whole world is worried about privacy to one degree or another. The young don’t seem to care because they have grown up in a world that is totally open to prying eyes. But for those who remember a time when we actually did have privacy it is hard to adjust.

And for me it is hard to understand that everything is open to thievery or mischief. It is a shock to realize that I must protect myself from anonymous hackers. I learn the new ways slowly. But in the end, I do learn them.

Along with political correctness which I abhor, I have always avoided living in a passworded prison of my own making. Today I learned that I must either stay offline or comply with the new ideas about passwords being protected. How many passwords do you have? It can mount up into the thousands I suppose. Certainly over 100, are currently buzzing around in my head, sometimes written down and sometimes NOT.

There are programs for remembering them, but as someone recently said, using them is putting all of them into “one basket”. So it becomes more risky, if an expert hacker decides to break in. There they all are, in one place. If any of you out there have ideas about what to do about this, I suppose you will not tell me because that might tip off an overly curious password thief.

We must remember more and more complicated series of usernames and passwords while those who would steal them become more and more adept. Perhaps it is good for our brains, the constant exercise of our memory. That would be a positive result, at least. There are all sorts of ways to remember. Using something only we know about is helpful for keeping privacy. Dogs names are popular. And numbers of things like zipcodes or a friends’ telephone number can be added, along with symbols like & or #. But how are we supposed to know which one is which? It is all very confusing, and a bit demoralizing.

There are certainly more important things to worry about in our chaotic world, yet when you are “hacked” all other things have to be put on hold until you can fix it. Today was a beautiful sunny day, the Friday before Easter. Good Friday. And I spent 2 or 3 hours inside dealing with this problem while my granddaughters dyed Easter eggs out on the sunny terrace. I cannot feel very forgiving to the hacker that caused my distress. Missing the fun of being outside with those young girls is something I cannot easily forgive.

However, I am planning to have a very Happy Easter with my family. I wish the same for each of you.