"123456" and "password" top list as worst passwords

The importance of using a solid password cannot be overstated and yet many continue to use ridiculously simple passwords. It is almost as if they are begging to be hacked.

SplashData has just released its list of top 10 worst passwords of the year and topping the list this year is "123456" and "password", which happens to be the top two entries in last year's list. Other notable repeats include "12345" and "qwerty." However, new to the top 10 are, quite strangely too may we add, "baseball", "dragon" and "football."

On the bright side, SplashData also said that its research revealed that less people are using these passwords. Mark Burnett, online security expert and author of “Perfect Passwords", said, "The good news is that it appears that more people are moving away from using these passwords. In 2014, the top 25 passwords represented about 2.2% of passwords exposed. While still frightening, that's the lowest percentage of people using the most common passwords I have seen in recent studies."

As always, we recommend users to use unique passwords that cannot be easily attributed to you. Also, it is highly recommended to use a mix of upper and lowercase characters as well as numbers. Otherwise, there are also good password management apps out there such as 1Password and LastPass that generates random passwords.

Source: SplashData