Ride the Lightning

Is Your Pet's Name Your Password? Shame, Shame.

August 15, 2013

As a recent post from Naked Security noted, if you want to hack into someone's account, try "Bella" as a password. Why? It's the most popular name for cats and dogs in the U.S. and pet names are the most common passwords.

If you're thinking, "stupid, stupid, stupid," you're right, but a recent survey by Google Apps had even more depressing news:

• 67% of us only change passwords when we have to. (sigh, guilty as charged on that one – and thank you John for making sure I am forced to change passwords)
• 21%, or one in 5, people admit to having clicked on spam links over the past year.
• 3% of those surveyed write down passwords on a Post-It note that they then glued around their desks.
• 48% share passwords with others like so many germ-saturated hankies.
• Only 41% of respondents updated their antivirus software this year.
• 19% have walked off and left their computer without logging out of a service.
• 15% of Brits admitted to peeking into their partner's emails, thanks, one assumes, to their partners having sashayed away without logging out.

Oh, and if you want to hack into the account of a Brit, try "Charlie" – the most popular pet name across the pond.