The 25 worst passwords of 2012

rockin'robin

rockin'robin

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Leading the way are "password" and "123456," but "ninja" and "jesus" are gaining ground

You probably don't think about your passwords much — and that's not a good thing. After all, it's the key that unlocks your email, your online bank account, your Facebook, your photo albums, and loads more. It may behoove you to examine your passwords and make sure they aren't on the latest list of the 25 worst passwords by business software firm SplashData, which is compiled once a year. The top three most common offenders — "password," "123456," and "12345678" — are unchanged from previous years, but there are a few dubious newcomers, including catchy terms like "ninja," "welcome," and "jesus."

To keep intruders out of your online life — so you don't become a victim like tech blogger Mat Honan — your best bet is to choose a password that's "longer than eight characters and includes letters, numbers, and characters," says Kim Zetter at Wired. An easy way to do this is to use a memorable phrase and intersperse it with characters: "TheQuickBrownFox" for example could be "The&Quick&Brown&Fox2," which is unquestionably stronger.

Here's this year's list of offenders, complete with ranking changes from last year:

1. password (Unchanged)

2. 123456 (Unchanged)

3. 12345678 (Unchanged)

4. abc123 (Up 1)

5. qwerty (Down 1)

6. monkey (Unchanged)

7. letmein (Up 1)

8. dragon (Up 2)

9. 111111 (Up 3)

10. baseball (Up 1)

11. iloveyou (Up 2)

12. trustno1 (Down 3)

13. 1234567 (Down 6)

14. sunshine (Up 1)

15. master (Down 1)

16. 123123 (Up 4)

17. welcome (New)

18. shadow (Up 1)

19. ashley (Down 3)

20. football (Up 5)

21. jesus (New)

22. michael (Up 2)

23. ninja (New)

24. mustang (New)

25. password1 (New)

The 25 worst passwords of 2012 - The Week
 
Hehe... my old job (closed down) used the 1234 for building alarm system and whenever I dialed it - I always thought of Spaceballs joke:

IMDB.com said:
[King Roland has given in to Dark Helmet's threats, and is telling him the combination to the "air shield"]
Roland: One.
Dark Helmet: One.
Colonel Sandurz: One.
Roland: Two.
Dark Helmet: Two.
Colonel Sandurz: Two.
Roland: Three.
Dark Helmet: Three.
Colonel Sandurz: Three.
Roland: Four.
Dark Helmet: Four.
Colonel Sandurz: Four.
Roland: Five.
Dark Helmet: Five.
Colonel Sandurz: Five.
Dark Helmet: So the combination is... one, two, three, four, five? That's the stupidest combination I've ever heard in my life! That's the kind of thing an idiot would have on his luggage!
Click to expand...

It always made me chuckle.
 
Some of these passwords are too short to work with some major systems these days.
They could've tried to divide between 8-16 character passwords VS 4-12 character passwords. 1234567 works fine in a 4-12 char password system, but only 12345678 works in a 8-16 char password system.
 
This remind me a funny story from my job few years back. I made a print out and I have to walk over to the printer in the hall way. As I pick up the print out and turned out there was a garbage charaters printed on the paper that look like this:

[-q30KLF9desf0$^)(P)Y(TGFP)891e(*%$%&*%&^$&^%)(^(&*)(*&_&_)*(POH(*%^ERFPO-08980968oGo97687^R$&^$%&^)*LJK:adhj

Suddendly I look up and saw one guy down the hall that look new to me asking another employee where my office is. The employee just pointed a finger at me. So I knew he must be a new employee on his first day.
He walk up to me:

New employee: Are you Sneakernet?
Me: Yeah, what can I do for you?
NE: Hi, I'm Jim and it's my first day. So, I believe I lost one page that give information about how to login and there's password in it. So, do you happen to know the password?
Me: (I handed him my paper)
Jim: (when he look at the paper, he face turned into puzzle, his jaw dropped a little) You got to be kidding!!!
Me: (I look over his paper) No...it's for you to write down the password..got pen?
Jim: Oh oh! LOL!!! Oh..yeah..I have a pen!

Jeesh... this guy think that I gave him that kind of password??
 
Federal employees use a variety of passwords: codes for the doors, passwords to login to their computer, passwords for various databases they use, you can't remember everything. I'm sure there's been a number of folks at the state and federal level that have used things just as stupid and foolish....always make your password hard...especially for banking and credit cards.

Laura
 
That reminds me of a part in Spaceballs. :)

[King Roland has given in to Dark Helmet's threats, and is telling him the combination to the "air shield".]

Roland: One.
Dark Helmet: One.
Colonel Sandurz: One.
Roland: Two.
Dark Helmet: Two.
Colonel Sandurz: Two.
Roland: Three.
Dark Helmet: Three.
Colonel Sandurz: Three.
Roland: Four.
Dark Helmet: Four.
Colonel Sandurz: Four.
Roland: Five.
Dark Helmet: Five.
Colonel Sandurz: Five.
Dark Helmet: So the combination is... one, two, three, four, five? That's the stupidest combination I've ever heard in my life! That's the kind of thing an idiot would have on his luggage!

President Skroob: Did it work? Where's the king?
Dark Helmet: It worked, sir. We have the combination.
President Skroob: Great. Now we can take every last breath of fresh air from Planet Druidia. What's the combination?
Colonel Sandurz: 1-2-3-4-5
President Skroob: 1-2-3-4-5?
Colonel Sandurz: Yes!
President Skroob: That's amazing. I've got the same combination on my luggage.
Dark Helmet, Colonel Sandurz: [looks at each other]
 
VamPyroX said:
That reminds me of a part in Spaceballs. :)

[King Roland has given in to Dark Helmet's threats, and is telling him the combination to the "air shield".]

Roland: One.
Dark Helmet: One.
Colonel Sandurz: One.
Roland: Two.
Dark Helmet: Two.
Colonel Sandurz: Two.
Roland: Three.
Dark Helmet: Three.
Colonel Sandurz: Three.
Roland: Four.
Dark Helmet: Four.
Colonel Sandurz: Four.
Roland: Five.
Dark Helmet: Five.
Colonel Sandurz: Five.
Dark Helmet: So the combination is... one, two, three, four, five? That's the stupidest combination I've ever heard in my life! That's the kind of thing an idiot would have on his luggage!

President Skroob: Did it work? Where's the king?
Dark Helmet: It worked, sir. We have the combination.
President Skroob: Great. Now we can take every last breath of fresh air from Planet Druidia. What's the combination?
Colonel Sandurz: 1-2-3-4-5
President Skroob: 1-2-3-4-5?
Colonel Sandurz: Yes!
President Skroob: That's amazing. I've got the same combination on my luggage.
Dark Helmet, Colonel Sandurz: [looks at each other]
Click to expand...

Did you put me on your ignore list or something? :squint: I already post that above. ;)
 
JMH said:
Did you put me on your ignore list or something? :squint: I already post that above. ;)
Click to expand...
My bad... didn't see yours. I just saw the first post and made a comment. :Oops:

At least, I added a second part. ;)
 
That's true. :) It was funniest part of Spaceballs. lol
 
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