What these most popular passwords of 2017 list reveals will startle you for sure

As most of the services are going digital, picking an unpredictable and difficult to hack password is very important. Passwords ensure your account safety and therefore, one should select passwords very carefully

A Tech University and security firm Dashlane study of 61 million leaked passwords has revealed the most common passwords of the last year. Image source: Pixabay

By ZeeBiz WebTeam

Updated: Wed, May 30, 2018
05:05 pm

ZeeBiz WebDesk

As most of the services are going digital, picking an unpredictable and difficult to hack password is very important. Passwords ensure your account safety and therefore, one should select passwords very carefully. However, that is not how things really happen. A latest study revealed despite numerous cases of hacks and data breaches, most people are picking passwords that are convenient rather than safe. This is because it is difficult for humans to memorise unique passwords.

A Tech university and security firm Dashlane study of 61 million leaked passwords has revealed the most common passwords of the last year. The study revealed that most people choose emotionally fuelled phrases such as 'f***you' and 'iloveyou' as passwords for an online account. Passwords like ‘qwerty’ and ‘123456’ also rank high on the list, according to a Daily Online report.

People often set their favourite brands, films, music, pop culture icons, and football teams as password. The study was conducted by Gang Wang from Virginia Tech in association with password manager Dashlane to compile the most popular passwords list of 2017. To prepare the report Wang analysed 61.5 million passwords leaked from 107 online services over the last eight years, the report said.

The study also revealed that most of the users re-use passwords between their online accounts. At least 52 per cent of the users re-used their passwords. Wang said people keep easy passwords as it is difficult for humans to memorise unique passwords. The researcher said reusing paswords or slightly modifying them is a dangerous practice.

Passwords around love, with 'beautiful', 'lovelove' and 'iloveyou' also ranked highly in the list. Vulgarity,'bulls***' and 'f***off' were also used frequently by the users.

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