These are the worlds most common passwords - Debut

These are the worlds most common passwords - Debut Pals. Brethren. Comrades. The Internet is a wonderful place, but it is often also filled with danger and dastardly villains. You get people climbin in your Windows and snatchin your data up all the time. All the more reason why people should have strong, hard-to-crack passwords, right? Unfortunately, a lot of people havent received the memo. 2016 was the year of the data breach seeing hacks of websites such as Yahoo, LinkedIn and, uh, AdultFriendFinder leak a whopping 10 million passwords to the world. Yikes. Keeper, a password manager and digital vault service, trawled through the passwords and did a ton of data-crunching on the leaks. What they found? Most Internet users are pretty much as clueless as ever when it comes to securing their information. The most common passwords in the world Heres the kicker, guys. The number one most common password,  123456, was used by a whopping 17 per cent of people. 17 per cent! In the words of Keepers researchers: Looking at the list of 2016s most common passwords, we couldnt stop shaking our heads. Rightly so considering that four of the top ten on the list were only six characters or shorter. Keepers research also revealed some notable findings about peoples password behaviour: The list of most common passwords havent really changed. People have been using qwerty  for years, with no sign of stopping. This means that its up to website operators and brave, very patient IT administrators to integrate prompts for users to create strong passwords into their website or apps user experience. Four out of the top ten most common passwords on the list were six characters or shorter. This is  not good brute-force cracking software (imagining a battering ram against your very weak password door) can suss out these passwords lickety-split. People  think theyre being clever by using mixed numbered and lettered passwords like  1q2w3e4r  or  123qwe.  However, seeing as they are sequential in pattern, these passwords are also easily crackable. If you take a close look at numbers 15, 17 and 20, these stand out because they seem fairly random. Therefore less easy to crack, hypothetically. Right? Well, apparently their appearance on the top 20 list indicates that these might be bot-created. This is important, as bots use the same ones over and over again to create fake accounts. Information like this is useful, so IT administrators can flag these bot accounts an delete them. Our top suggestions for keeping your data secure Enable two-factor authentication wherever possible. This puts another wall in front of potential hackers or phishers. Use a mix of capital letters, numbers, symbols and upper/lowercase letters. Ensure your password is at least eight characters long. We know this is a pain but try not to use the same password for all of your accounts. If you cant remember all of your passwords, use an online (and secure) password manager to keep track. These top 5 password manager apps for Android are a good shout. In time, most accounts can be compromised. However, using those tips, you can limit the damage caused by malicious attacks on your accounts. Be safe, guys! Download the Debut app and  get Talent-Spotted by amazing graduate employers! Connect with Debut on Facebook and Twitter