Are You Getting Hacked? Your Password Could Be to Blame
Transcript
Here’s your “Slap in the Face” Award for this week. And it’s one for everybody out there who is taking the easy way out when they set up security for their online accounts.
Want to save a lot of money and a lot of trouble? Get very serious about your passwords.
The easiest way to gain access to your banking or brokerage account, or even your charge cards, is by hacking your password. And most people are making it easy.
The 10 most common passwords are…
- 12345
- 123456
- 123456789
- qwerty
- password
- 111111
- 12345678
- abc123
- 1234567
- password1.
(“Qwerty” comes from the first six letters on a keyboard in the upper left-hand corner.)
Really?! That’s the best we can do to protect our assets?
It has gotten so bad, and the risks are so great, that security experts are now offering to delay how often you have to change your passwords (one of the biggest pains in our modern world) if we will create passwords that are considered more hack-resistant.
The average person has 25 online accounts, and 81% of all breaches of these accounts are caused by weak passwords.
The average desktop PC has become so powerful, most passwords can be cracked in as little as a few hours. And the costs associated with weak passwords are astronomical.
If you can’t afford to have your savings, checking and brokerage accounts emptied – and I don’t know anybody who can – please, use at least 16 letters, numbers or symbols in your passwords. That’s what experts tell us are virtually unhackable.
Or you can take it easy and keep using your name, address or 12345… Why not roll the dice just one more time?
Only kidding…
Get serious about your online security, or get robbed. It’s that simple.
Good investing,
Steve