Password Checkup, the Google extension that lets you know if your password was stolen

The theft of passwords on the internet is the order of the day.

News about cyber attacks, large-scale hacking and phishing scams are increasingly taking over. Many times, data and passwords are sold in the dark network, the favorite corner of online criminals.

But how did you know you were a prey to computer criminals?

Google has just launched a rogue tool that it developed together with cryptography researchers from Stanford University USA, so that Chrome users know if their password is secure enough.

It is a free extension called Password Checkup that sends you an alert if your password is stolen.

Google says on its website that this new feature "helps you protect the accounts that were affected by data breaches."

"When you sign up, if you enter a username and password that is no longer secure because there was a data leak known to Google, you will receive an alert," the company explains.

In that alert, the system will ask you to review your password and change it if you use the same credentials for any other account.

The keys of a good password
Do not use personal information or your username
Use as few words as possible
Use symbols, capitals and numbers
Use different passwords for each service and change them every so often

"Passwork Checkup was created with privacy in mind," says Google.

The technology also ensures that the extension does not provide any information about the accounts, passwords or devices of its users, but "anonymous information about the number of searches in unsafe credentials."

Google says that in order to carry out the verification it does a verification with more than 4,000 million passwords to detect if there is any coincidence.

But if you really suspect that you hacked the account, you see how easy it is to check it on the web Have I Been Pwned? ("Did they hack me?"), The most important platform for detecting compromised accounts.

What to do if they hacked you?
Change your password immediately, the longer and complex, the better (and use a different one for each site)
Use a password manager, for example, LastPass (a free service)
Do not write any of your passwords on your phone or in your email account
Enable an additional security code or key to your password
Use 2-step verification (protect your account also with your mobile phone)