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25 Worst Passwords That Leave You Open to Being Hacked and Identity Theft

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25 worst passwords of 2014
There are still a lot of people out there who do a poor job creating their passwords. We know this because the most common passwords keep appearing year after year, even when people are warned that these passwords aren’t secure and can easily be hacked. If you have any of the following 25 worst passwords as one of yours, you should change it right away. Not doing so will increase your chance of having your accounts hacked, and even have your identity stolen.

This current list of the 25 worst passwords was compiled by the company SplashData. The company created a list by going through more than 3.3 million leaked passwords over the past year, with the vast majority of them coming from North America and Western Europe. The worst of the worst in passwords was “123456” which retained the top spot which it held in 2013 as well. This was followed by the password “password” which took second place, and “12345” which came in third place.

While there isn’t a good excuse for using the common passwords, people end up using them because they want something easy to remember so they don’t forget theirs. The result many times is keyboard patterns such as “123456” and “qwerty” which are easy to guess. Because these types of passwords are based on a keyboard pattern, they are weak. Hackers know these patterns, and they will be among the first they test when trying to break into an account. It really doesn’t matter how long the patterned sequence is, because it’s based on a pattern, it’s much weaker than a combination of non-patterned numbers and letters.

This year saw ten new passwords make their way into the top 25 most common in 2014 that weren’t there in 2013. This included people using their favorite sport as a password (baseball and football were new to the list, both making it into the top ten) and favorite superhero (batman and superman both made the list). Other themes found within the top 100 most common passwords included swear words, common baby names, famous athletes and movies.

There are a number of things you can do to protect your accounts with a quality password which are easy to implement:

Create a secure password

Create a password of 8 characters or more made up of numbers, letters and symbols. Avoid using common keyboard patterns, common words and publicly available information (your address or phone number)

Use a unique password for each account

Don’t use the same password for multiple accounts because if one password does get compromised, all your accounts are compromised, not just one.

Keep your password recovery options up-to-date

If you do forget your password or get locked out, you need a way to get back in. If you don’t have recovery options up to date, you may never get back in. Keeping an up-to date email with the recovery also may give you a heads up if one of your accounts has been compromised with a notice of a password being changed.

Below you’ll find the 25 Worst Passwords of 2014

1. 123456
2. password
3. 12345
4. 12345678
5. qwerty
6. 1234567890
7. 1234
8. baseball (New to top 25)
9. dragon (New to top 25)
10. football (New to top 25)
11. 1234567
12. monkey
13. letmein
14. abc123
15. 111111
16. mustang (New to top 25)
17. access (New to top 25)
18. shadow
19. master (New to top 25)
20. michael (New to top 25)
21. superman (New to top 25)
22. 696969 (New to top 25)
23. 123123
24. batman (New to top 25)
25. trustno1

(Photo courtesy of Dev.Arka)

Free Password Tracking

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password

If you do much shopping, banking, and investing online, then no doubt you are drowning in a sea of passwords. That doesn’t even include the passwords you have to remember for your network, your router, and all the other technological solutions you use. While most sites and devices will help you recover a password or reset it if you don’t remember it, some will make you jump through a lot of hoops. While that’s to protect your security, it can be time consuming and annoying.

What you need is a way to easily keep track of all of those passwords. You don’t want to just write them on a sheet of paper that you keep by your desk. If someone breaks in to your home and steals it, all of your information is at risk. Neither do you want to use the same password on every site. If someone figures it out, they’ll have all of your information. However, there are some technological solutions and some old fashioned ideas that can help you keep track of those passwords.

Pen, paper, and a secure storage method

If you want to use good old pencil and paper lists to track your passwords, make sure you have a safe place to store them. A safe in your house is the best option, but you could find other hiding places. Just don’t leave it on the desk, out in the open, or in the place where you keep your financial records.

Create a document on your computer and password protect it

You can create a regular spreadsheet or text document and password protect it. Most applications have the option for you to require a password to open a document created in that application. Look in the help files or Google your specific application to find out how to do this.

Free password applications

There are many free password tracking applications available. The best encrypt your data and protect it behind a master password so that even if your computer is stolen, it’s very difficult to crack the application to see the passwords. A brief list of a few you might want to check includes:

Be careful about using anything that is browser or cloud based. If someone were to hack into the cloud database, your information would be at risk. While the risk is probably low, it’s a risk nonetheless. Some browser solutions that remember passwords for you are great for your personal use, but if your computer is stolen those sites will be open to anyone who gets your machine.

Create a system you can remember

If you just want to be able to remember your passwords, you can create and stick with a system you’ll remember. For example, maybe you make your base password something like, “simplepassword.” (This is only an example. You’ll want to choose something more challenging than this.) Then for each new site you encounter you add some letters to the beginning or end that correspond to the site you’re using. So your password becomes, “simplepasswordbank” for your bank account and, “simplepasswordebay” for eBay. For even more challenging passwords, use numbers or characters at the beginning or end. Having a system like this makes it easier to remember your passwords without having to store them anywhere.

If you’re using a program that requires a master password, make sure that your heirs know how to access the information. If something happens to you it will be much easier for them to handle your affairs if they can get hold of your passwords. Even if you’re using pen and paper, make sure to tell them where you keep the document.

Keeping track of passwords doesn’t have to be difficult or expensive and you don’t have to be constantly aggravated by lost and forgotten passwords. Spend some time experimenting with different solutions until you find the one that works best for you.

(Photo courtesy of Dev.Arka)