Changing your Password

For Email, Office 365 Turnitin, Computer Lab or Moodle Password

Before you can change your main password, you MUST have registered with the password recovery system first.
To reset or change your password, go to www.office.com. Sign in or if you cannot remember your password, choose to reset it.

SMP password change

Your SMP password is separate to all other passwords. Use the Forgotten Password link on the SMP website if you have forgotten it.

Turnitin password change

Click here to change your Turnitin Password. 

Password Expired!

When your password has expired, this means you must change it. Either log into a computer in the Computer Lab, and it will make you change your password, or login to office.com and change your password from there. When your password is expired, you will have to change it. 

When possible, we highly suggest using different passwords for different portals. Someone who knows your internet password can access your email and use your printing credit. Now if you use the same password for social networking, this is a security problem. Always use a different password for you social networking sites, such as Facebook, or Twitter.

For Internet access, the Computer Lab, Moodle and HCHE Email, they all use the same password. This password is reset, either by logging into the Computer Lab (and pressing Ctrl Alt Del keys), or using the password change link above.

Turnitin uses a separate password to all other portals. Unless you have used the same password as other sites, this password will be different. You must change the password from their site. See the link above.

SMP uses a separate password to all other portals. Like Turnitin, unless you have used the same password as other sites, this password will be different. You must change the password from their site. See the link above.

Usernames:

Your username for internet, the Computer Lab and Moodle is always just the username part, without the @hche.ac.za section. For example, smmithj or khhumaloh

Your HCHE Gmail, SMP, and Turnitin username’s, are always the full email address, so it will always include the @hche.ac.za section. For example, smmithj@hche.ac.za or khhumaloh@hche.ac.za

 

Creating a Safe Password:

The safest passwords are 12 or more characters in length, and include a mixture of:

  • Symbols (eg, % or $ or #, etc),
  • Numbers (1 or 2 or 6, etc),
  • Lower case letters (u or s or t, etc),
  • Upper case Letters (U or S or T, etc).

You can create short sentences like: I Love to eat apples. Then turn that into a password, such as: IL0v3.t0E@tApples

The mere fact that a password is 12 or more characters in length, makes is practically impossible to hack by common brute force password cracking software. This means you would not need to add many special characters to make it more complicated.

Please see the video below on creating a safe password: