Friday, September 25, 2009

Password-Retrieval Overkill?

Today I needed to top up my PC Phone Card to make a long-distance phone call. I don't have a long-distance plan since I don't really make long-distance calls, having a long-distance calling card is a good, inexpensive option. I've topped up the card a few times before, but it's been a while since I've last accessed my account. As a result, I could remember neither my username nor my password. Or rather, I thought I did, but apparently I don't. So I decided to use the site's Lost/forgot your password? link. As you can see from that link, you need to remember either the e-mail address hooked into the account AND your (PC) account password to retrieve your username, OR your e-mail address AND your username to retrieve your password.

I apparently know neither my username nor my password, so I guess I'm SOL. I know that requiring two pieces of information to retrieve your account information is done purely for security reasons, but seriously...this is overkill. Shouldn't knowing the e-mail address suffice? I guess they're preventing account information from going to the wrong e-mail address. But still. From where I'm sitting, this is FRUSTRATING!!!

I've got the info written down somewhere in an encrypted file on my computer at home (yes, I know the encryption key), so I guess I'll have to wait until I get home to do this. Arrrrrrrrrrrgh! So a 5-minute task winds up turning into a wasted 30 minutes of trying to guess my login credentials.

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