These Are The Weakest Passwords Of The Year

When protecting sensitive information online from criminals, snoops, hackers, thieves, catfish, and other cyber criminals, passwords are an essential first line of protection.

You risk having your privacy and security compromised by hackers and other undesirable actors if you use easy-to-guess passwords.

NordPass has released its yearly list of the 200 most popular passwords; sure enough, there are a few repeat offenders among them. Here are a few examples of the most popular yet insecure password combinations:

123456
Admin
Password
Guest

Cybercriminals can easily crack these passwords. You’d be well-advised to change your passwords immediately if you are using any of the ones listed above.

If you want a strong password that hackers won’t be able to guess easily, follow these simple guidelines.

A longer password with more characters is preferable to make it more difficult for hackers to crack. Passwords of 12–14 characters or more are typically considered secure.

Variety is key. Numbers, symbols, capitalization, and lowercase letters must all be present. To prevent hackers from accessing it, make everything as random as possible. Passwords like ‘Red%!6&red Hike!’ are far more challenging to break than ‘Red123.

Replacing letters with common symbols is predictable. It would be too obvious if your name were Steven and your password was $teven.

Choose passkeys over passwords wherever you can. Passkeys are secure and less likely to be compromised since they are unique codes connected to your device. As a more secure option, passkey support is being used by more and more organizations, including Apple, Google, Amazon, and Microsoft.

Use a unique password for each account, and never write them down.

Nevertheless, it may be rather challenging to remember all those combinations of letters and numbers, mainly when much of our work is done online, and we need to have many accounts.

You are advised to use a password manager for that exact reason. From online banking and shopping to accessing medical information, password organizers make generating, saving, filling, and managing passwords for all your online activities easy. It is more difficult for anybody, including the password management provider, to guess your password when you use one of the several password managers that include login encryption. A password has a purpose beyond granting access to internet accounts. When it comes to protecting your private information from cybercriminals, they are your first line of protection.