Many of us either use weak passwords or reuse passwords on multiple accounts. Storing your passwords in your browser, a document, or in writing opens you up to a number of threats, and also increases your risk of losing that important data should something happen to your device or physical copies. This makes us more susceptible to crimes such as identity theft. A password manager will generate, retrieve, and keep track of super-long, crazy-random passwords across countless accounts for you.

Yes, passwords are at the core of what a password manager protects (hey, it’s in the name), but password managers do much more. Consider all of your most valuable documents – passport, credit cards, birth certificate, social security – just to name a few. With a password manager, you can create a secure note for each of these documents where you can store all the relevant information, including a photo of the document itself!

It gets better though. How many times have you filled out your shipping address when you’ve bought something online? Too many. With a password manager you can store your most commonly-used (and even the rare!) profiles, like your billing address, work shipping address, home shipping address, and more, so you’re not wasting time the next time you fill out forms online.

Using a password manager saves from all those lost minutes that you spend filling out forms and credit card numbers by filling them in for you. Password managers will also quickly generate new passwords for you when you’re signing up for your account. That means you can toss your own personal password system to the wind (see ya later, MissFluffy02!) Most importantly, think about all those times you spend racking your brain to recall a password. And then how much time you spend trying to reset the password once you’ve been locked out.

And to get all that security, you’ll only need to remember a single password, the one you use to unlock your so-called vault. Your login data will be locked down and, at the same time, remain right at your fingertips – with encryption so strong that it might take a hacker between decades and forever to crack.

When moving to a password manager, one of the first concerns that comes up is security. You might be wondering, “Should I be putting all my eggs in one basket?” And, “Now I just have one master password, so if that’s stolen, they’ll get everything!”

Well, yes, you are putting all your passwords in one basket. But it’s a very, very safe basket. Password managers have layers upon layers upon layers of protection in place to protect your passwords and important documents.

Part of that is because, when you store things in your vault, it’s encrypted with a key. Think of it like a box with a big old padlock. You put everything you want to keep safe in that box. When you’re ready to store it, you lock up that box. You still have the key in your hand (your master password) and the password manager holds the box for you, all locked up.

If someone were to smash through all the layers (which would take lifetimes, by the way) and open your box, the pieces would all be mashed up and totally unreadable. Only with your original key (your master password) would all those pieces fit together again to reveal your passwords and the other data in your vault.

But what if they steal the master password? Well, the first recommendation is to never use your master password for anything else. That just makes it easier to steal. But you can also take advantage of other things like two-factor authentication, to add another login step before access is granted to the vault. And any time someone logs in from a new device or location, they must first verify the new access before they can get in.

Now that you’re more #CyberAware, it’s time to turn this knowledge about passwords and security into action. Today is the day. Sign up for a password manager and get all your logins and important information into your secure vault.

View the Best Password Managers of 2021 from Digital.com.