If you use a 4-digit password to protect your phone – or your credit card or anything really – you’ll want to know this. According to a study conducted by iPhone app developer Daniel Amitay, millions of iPhone users pick highly predictable password combinations – meaning that their devices could easily be hacked.
Although 10,000 possible combinations are available, 15% of users pick one of ten four-digit combinations. The most popular are ‘1234’ and ‘0000’, as well as ‘2580’ (the vertical middle row) and ‘1111’.
Less popular – but still widely used – are passwords ‘5555’, ‘LOVE’ (‘5683’), ‘0582’, ‘2222’, ‘1212’ and, surprisingly, ‘1998’. So if your password is one of the ten listed, you might want to change it as soon as possible.
You can see full results of the study here.
Is there such a thing as Password Overload? There must be because I have it. With everyone having a hundred passwords for a 1000 different things (or do you use the same one for everything?), it’s not really surprising that so many of us are taking the easy option and using common passwords.
So – how do you handle the password situation? Do you have just one, or a few different passwords? Do you remember them all, or do you allow your internet browser to remember them for you? Do you use a special app to store them all somewhere, or do you write them all down somewhere so that you’ll never forget? Are you as overwhelmed as me?
Top Comments
I have a huge list of different usernames and passwords for different things, but instead of writing down what the password is, I write things like..."Child we didn't have" - which refers to the boys name we had chosen, when we ended up having a girl, or "1st street we lived in" or "my first dog".
I always add the same number and symbol combination to these words.
Doing it this way means that I have some record of what my passwords are, but one that is not completely transparent.
I recently got a VIrgin Credit Card and I kid you not, there is three different PIN's for the one account:
1. a PIN for when you actually use the card
2. a PIN for internet banking
3 a PIN for phone banking
And they all must be different and cannot be changed! I rang them to request a change and they said it is not possible....... Like seriously - we have enough passwords and PINs to remember already people!!!
Banking in London is the same, I feel like I may as well tell them what I had for breakfast