No one can hack your email address if they don't know what it is. For all things UO related except EA Accounts management I use an email account in my board name, Petra Fyde.
1. Like Petra says, use a dedicated email account that isn't used anywhere else.
2. Don't reuse passwords. I know, it's a pain to have different passwords for each account, but so is getting hacked. Use a password vault if you want, I use an protected Word file.
3. Use a strong password.That means using at least one of: Upper Case, Lower Case, Number, and a Special Character (!, @, #, etc.). That means with most systems you have 96 characters available.
4. 8 characters is no longer enough. Use 12 or more. An 8 character password can be cracked in about 2 hours, while 12 characters takes 17,000 years using current technology. This is from research published last month, forget who reported it, but think it was McAfee.