The 10 most easily hacked passwords workers still use
July 30, 2010 by Jared BilskiPosted in: Communication tips, Fraud prevention, In this week's e-newsletter, Latest news & views, Management issues, Technology, Uncategorized
With all of the sensitive data that Finance workers handle on a daily basis, you may want to have them revisit the strength of the passwords they’re using.
Why? If your employees are like most, then they’ve chosen passwords that are easily hacked.
A recent analysis of 32 million passwords by Imperva highlighted the 10 most popular passwords, which should be avoided like the plague:
- 123456 (290,731 users)
- 12345 (79,078 users)
- 123456789 (76,790 users)
- Password (61,958 users)
- Iloveyou (51,622 users)
- Princess (35,231 users)
- Rockyou (22,588 users)
- 1234567 (21,726 users)
- 12345678 (29,533 users)
- abc123 (17,542 users).
It may be good idea to send out an e-mail to Finance telling workers not to use any of the above choices when they have create a secure log-in.
For a strong password, experts suggest an alpha-numeric combination that is greater than six characters. Also, passwords should be changed every 30 days.
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Tags: Alpha-numeric combination, Easily hacked passwords, Finance workers, Imperva, Passwords, Popular passwords, Sensitive data
August 2nd, 2010 at 3:35 pm
I agree with everything except changing the password every 30 days. Unless the person involved is really good at memorizing those types of things, they will most likely write down the changing code somewhere for easy access, which defeats the purpose of having a password in place. I have seen the password on a post-it note taped to the monitor so many times that that I want to scream, and they always say it is because they cannot remember an involved password, especially if they have to change it regularly. The list above also left out some of the other more common passwords I have seen used: God, Jesus, Christ, ILoveGod, ILoveJesus, 987654 (or any other length doing decreasing numbers), (spouse’s name), (child’s name), (pet’s name), (date of birth–themselves, their spouse, their child).
August 5th, 2010 at 9:08 am
I worked for a company that changed passwords every 30 days, what people used was their spouse’s name with the numeric month at the end….i.e. donna01 for January…etc