Moving and Securing Shared Accounts

When scaling your business down, you should reduce the amount of money spent on software and other services. Sometimes these services are based on the number of user accounts associated with your account. You might find yourself deleting accounts for any employees who have left, and scaling down the number of accounts so that your team shares access to a single account.

​controversy​ I am aware terms of service for some software services don’t allow this. But when a business is faced with surviving and paying bills and salary for the month, or paying for additional user accounts, most of us will choose the former.

When moving to a shared account, you will need to change the account password and disable 2FA that might be set up to be only accessible from your device. Don’t just stop there and consider this done. Instead, follow the same tips we covered in Part II:

1. Set up the shared account to use an email that is accessible by the team, like a group email.

2. Generate that new password from your password manager and make it long—over 16 characters. It shouldn’t be a password that is easy for your team to remember or write down on a Post-it Note.

3. Share the password with your employees using your password manager.

4. Set up 2FA using your password manager’s one-time password function.

These few steps actually help protect your business in a few different ways:

• Setting up the new account with a unique, long password makes it harder for someone outside the business to guess it.

• Storing the shared account password in a central place like a password manager makes it easier to reset when employees leave.

• Having 2FA set up in the password manager makes it harder for employees who have left the business to get into the account after they leave.

• Using an account email that is accessible by the team means any account changes, like password or account configuration changes, are visible.

These actions can help you regain control over accounts that will now be used and shared amongst your team, while also keeping them as safe as you can.