People are still using incredibly weak, unsafe passwords, study finds

People are still using incredibly weak, unsafe passwords, study finds
Wednesday 24 November 2021 - 00:10

Password manager NordPass has published the 2021 edition of its most common passwords list, and audiences are dumbfounded at many people’s choice of “incredibly weak and common passwords” that can easily be cracked.

The analysis of global password habits is revealing internet users are still performing poorly when it comes to credential management.

The password management service has compiled a list of the top 200 most common passwords in the world.

The list includes the passwords ranked by most to least common, how long it would take to crack it, and how many times they appeared in their research.

The most internationally common password was found to be “123456,” which appeared more than 103 million times in NordPass’ search.

The password would take less than one second to crack, which is the case for all top 50 most common passwords.

Passwords two through five include “123456789,” “12345,” “qwerty,” and “password,” in that order.

Swear words are also commonly used, and when it comes to animal themes, “dolphin” was the most popular choice internationally.

Aside from variations of numbers and keyboard letter combinations, local password options made the international top 10, including the surname “Chregan” in South Africa, the city “Barcelona” in Spain, and the name “Tiffany” in France.

In some countries passwords relating to religion were popular. “Christ” was the 19th most common password used in Nigeria, accounting for 7,169 users.

In Saudi Arabia, “Bismillah,” meaning in the name of God, was used by 1,599 people, ranking 30th nationally.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, “1g2w3e4r,” “gwerty123,” ”myspace1,” and “Michelle” all tied for the toughest most common passwords on the list, requiring three hours to crack.

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