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The story
A TBS news report found that, amid a wave of unauthorized access incidents and data leaks, young people are increasingly turning to an “analog comeback” — writing passwords down in paper notebooks instead of storing them digitally. Dedicated password notebooks are reportedly selling out at 100-yen shops. The 5ch thread sparked by the report was a mix of opinions: some write passwords on paper using their own private encryption rules, others rely on password-manager apps or maximum-length random strings, and skeptics warned that losing the notebook — or getting burglarized — would be game over. Many commenters also pointed out that if the leak happens on the server side, changing how you store your password doesn’t help at all.
Is writing it on paper really the best defense? How to protect your “password” amid repeated data leaks — 100-yen shops running out of “dedicated notebooks”… young people embrace an “analog comeback” while companies move to offload personal data [N Sta Explains]
Mon, Nov 9, 9:32 PM JST
TBS NEWS DIG Powered by JNN
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Original article here
What people said
No one would ever guess that the password for the word "password" is literally "password."
Nah, "pasuwa-do" (password spelled out phonetically in Japanese) is the strongest.
That's all already leaked out there anyway. It's only random-number tables and biometrics holding the line at this point.
That's exactly what I do. Except I store it in a form only I can decode.
Like, on my PC I'll save it as "3 ya 1," but the real password is something like "3301yanineko1919."
The root server itself gets tampered with and turned into a malware-dispensing device, and the info on your PC gets siphoned off that way.
The moment you let a computer record it, it's already at risk of leaking. Never store passwords digitally. Handwrite them on paper — stick to that no matter what. And don't even take a photo of it.
No matter how far you take it, as long as there's any path to access rights, there's always a hole somewhere —
unless someone invents a way to keep it entirely inside your own head.
If your handwriting is bad enough that literally nobody can read it, you're fine.
Though there's a chance even you can't read it.
Make sure you actually encrypt it before writing it down.
Is it okay if I just tack my initials or birthday onto the password?
Everything's stored in the flip phone's contact list, in a code only I understand.
it's worse than some random scrap of paper lying on the ground.
Back in the day everyone used to memorize the 52-character "revival spell" password from Dragon Quest II.
Just imagine if that facial-recognition data got leaked…
Exactly this.
Now I get why people in the old days wrote in cursive "kuzushiji" script.
And on top of that, they used a "kaō" (a stylized personal signature mark) instead of a stamp.
Same here.
I always max out the character limit with a random string, so there's no way I could ever memorize it anyway.
When I was doing temp factory work, I had a coworker who had his home address tattooed on his arm, lol.
Furiosa had a star map tattooed on her left arm showing the way back to her homeland.
Doesn't matter how clever it is if it leaks anyway.
Before that even comes up, there's the durability problem with magnetic media.
Paper, on the other hand, has a historical track record of lasting centuries — longer than a human lifespan.
but none of that matters once AI gets involved.
Because it skips the login server entirely and gets full access straight to the data.
It's not even stealing logins person by person anymore.
And what happens when you lose that?
A notebook labeled specifically for passwords is basically you announcing "the keys are right here" yourself.
I recently trimmed it down to around 30.
Even if you think you've cut it down, the company on the other end still has it all stored. That's the actual problem.
Background and Key Points of This Debate
Part of why “paper management” for passwords has drawn attention is that most recent unauthorized-access incidents have originated not on users’ own devices, but on the servers of the companies providing the service. Commenters in the thread pointed out scenarios where a server itself gets tampered with and has its entire data store siphoned off, or where AI bypasses the login authentication process altogether to access data directly — meaning whether you write your password on paper or not is only ever part of the countermeasure. At the same time, the thread also debated weaknesses specific to paper itself, such as its superior durability compared to magnetic media, versus the risk that simply owning a dedicated notebook advertises “the keys are here.” Whether password-manager apps or handwritten notes are better isn’t a simple call either way: paper resists theft over a network but is vulnerable to theft, fire, and physical degradation over time — and the article and comments never clearly spell out that each storage method carries its own distinct threat model.
*This article is compiled as an excerpt and summary of the 5ch (News Speed+) thread “[Unauthorized Access] Is Writing It on Paper Really the Best? How to Protect Your “Password” Amid Repeated Data Leaks — 100-Yen Shops Running Out of “Dedicated Notebooks”… Young People Embrace an “Analog Comeback”.”
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