Basic Home Computer Security Question #5. Why should I change the password of my router once I install it?

Basic Home Computer Security Question #5. Why should I change the password of my router once I install it?

I’m glad somebody asked this question, because it's often overlooked and is a huge mistake if you don’t do it. You must absolutely change both the username and password on any network device that you install, such as;
1) router
2) firewall
The reason is most network devices must come with a default username or password and there are several tools out there that will just scan for devices and automatically enter default usernames or passwords. In fact to make it more dangerous a hacker can get a scanner that will go out and find a network device from certain vendor, and they can manually enter the default username or password to try and gain access to this device. Once someone has access to the device protecting your network, they can open it up for access, sniff your network for usernames or passwords, sniff for personal information that will allow them to steal your identity credentials.
Just for laughs enter this URL and you will see how easy it is to gain the default usernames and passwords for all vendors networked devices.
http://www.governmentsecurity.org/articles/DefaultLoginsandPasswordsforNetworkedDevices.php