According to Cybernews, a research-based publication dedicated to investigating cybersecurity techniques, there is no such thing as a unique password. The team analyzed over 15.2 billion passwords and discovered that only 2.2 billion were unique. Indeed, the team found that the majority of people use weak passwords that often include: their birth year, the year they created the password, a meaningful year, the term password, digits 12345, letters qwerty, their favorite sports team, their favorite curse word, famous world’s cities, and even their favorite food.
Unfortunately, the lack of diversity in password generation could have dramatic consequences. Creating a password that’s easy to remember has wrongly become the top priority of digital users. In reality, you need to change your passwords frequently to stay away from common patterns. Here’s why it matters:
You use the same password many times
Repeating passwords across your digital accounts could significantly affect your digital data. If you use the same password on many platforms, you need to fix the issue. Hackers who uncover one password could gain access to multiple accounts online.
It’s easy to guess
Cybernews revealed that one of the most commonly used terms is password, making it easy to guess even for an inexperienced hacker. Additionally, most people tend to refer to meaningful information in their passwords, such as their favorite food or sports team. For people who know you, it’s easy to guess the correct password. Those who don’t know you can find all the information they need from your social media posts.
It’s too simple
Quite frankly, Qwerty and Password2010 might be easy to remember, but that’s because they are not strong passwords. Hackers can easily crack simple passwords. The ideal password should:
- Be longer than 8 or 9 characters
- Combine digits, letters, and special characters
- Use capital letters (preferably not at the start of the word)
- Break the word pattern
For instance, you could create something more secure rather than using Qwerty, such as !qW3e%R1t&y.
You’ve saved it elsewhere
The typical employees need to type over 50 passwords to access various business apps and tools during a normal workday. It is a lot to remember. Whether you keep a post-it note in your wallet with your passwords or an Excel sheet on your laptop, writing down your passwords exposes you to security leaks. That’s precisely why most businesses with professional IT services use a password management tool to store all passwords. You can also let the password manager generate and save secure passwords on your behalf.
It stops hackers or other users from long-term access
How do you know you’ve been hacked? The truth is that it’s not always obvious. Frequently changing your password ensures that hackers or former employees can’t maintain long-term access to business data in case of a password leak. We also strongly recommend adding a two-factor authentication process to individual online accounts. This will keep unwanted intrusion at bay and protect the company’s data. Your IT team can also create different access rights so the admin team can reset two-factor authentication passwords when an employee leaves the company.
In conclusion, the last thing you want is a password you can remember easily. Indeed, a password that’s easy to remember is likely to be used multiple times, easy to guess, saved in plain sight, or even easy to decipher with hacker’s tech. You need to keep your data safe with strict password best practices.
