NewsPronto

 
Men's Weekly

.

USA Conversation

The Conversation USA

The Conversation USA

The long history, and short future, of the password

  • Written by Brian Lennon, Associate Professor of English and Comparative Literature; Director, Digital Culture and Media Initiative, Pennsylvania State University
imageAn artist's depiction of the 'shibboleth incident.'Detail from art by H. de Blois, from The Bible and Its Story Taught by One Thousand Picture Lessons, vol. 3, edited by Charles F. Horne and Julius A. Bewer, 1908

In Western history, the concept of the password can be traced as far back as the so-called “shibboleth incident” in the 12th...

Read more: The long history, and short future, of the password

More Articles ...

  1. Why emojis –
  2. Could a doodle replace your password?
  3. Trump's plan to dismantle national monuments comes with steep cultural and ecological costs
  4. Why Dodd-Frank – or its repeal – won't save us from the next crippling Wall Street crash
  5. A 147-year-old dispute between church and state spills onto a school playground
  6. What was the protest group Students for a Democratic Society? Five questions answered
  7. Inequality is getting worse, but fewer people than ever are aware of it
  8. Why America's public media can't do its job
  9. Blasphemy isn't just a problem in the Muslim world
  10. How to boil down a pile of diverse research papers into one cohesive picture
  11. The cultural division that explains global political shocks from Brexit to Le Pen
  12. Does ESPN have anywhere to go but down?
  13. How Trump's tax proposal could weaken faith in the system's fairness
  14. Why we choose terrible passwords, and how to fix them
  15. How crossing the US-Mexico border became a crime
  16. A digital archive of slave voyages details the largest forced migration in history
  17. Can blockchain technology help poor people around the world?
  18. Too pretty to play? Stephen Curry and the light-skinned black athlete
  19. Two key takeaways from the pope's TED talk
  20. How parents can help autistic children make sense of their world
  21. The patients we do not see
  22. How Woodrow Wilson's propaganda machine changed American journalism
  23. Can charity save journalism from market failure?
  24. Is charter school fraud the next Enron?
  25. New statistical methods would let researchers deal with data in better, more robust ways
  26. Is there any way to stop ad creep?
  27. National monuments: Presidents can create them, but only Congress can undo them
  28. Trump’s offshore oil drilling push: Five essential reads
  29. Is the death penalty un-Christian?
  30. Did artists lead the way in mathematics?
  31. The changing nature of sacred spaces
  32. Is the paper industry getting greener? Five questions answered
  33. One way Trump went big league in his first 100 days
  34. Should the giving styles of the rich and famous alarm us all?
  35. Federal role in education has a long history
  36. Physics of poo: Why it takes you and an elephant the same amount of time
  37. Would Trump's tax cut be the biggest ever? Fat chance
  38. Mine wars: The struggle for coal miners' health care and pension benefits comes to a head
  39. To have impact, the People's Climate March needs to reach beyond activists
  40. 100 days of presidential threats
  41. Syria’s forgotten pluralism and why it matters today
  42. 'Anumeric' people: What happens when a language has no words for numbers?
  43. Can Bill Nye – or any other science show – really save the world?
  44. Cutting EPA budget puts babies at risk – and makes little economic sense
  45. Police around the world learn to fight global-scale cybercrime
  46. Confused about Trump's border wall?: 7 essential reads
  47. Why cuts in funding for UN, climate change research imperil fight against malaria
  48. What the Trump team should consider before axing Meals on Wheels funds
  49. For restaurants looking to boost profits, it's often about everything but the food
  50. Can we design a better fuel economy label?