Despite the efforts banks, companies and even governments go to in order to educate the population at large about basic security measures to protect devices and privacy, apparently the biggest threat is not hackers and cyber criminals, per se -it’s stupidity.

The most common passwords show that many people continue to put themselves at risk of hacking, despite all the many, many well-publicised data leaks.

Seriously, who still uses ‘password’ as a password in 2017? And yet it still tops the list every year. From this writer’s own experience, you’d be surprised how many total strangers’ devices you can unlock just by trying a few of the more obvious password candidates.

Come on, people, at least throw in a number and an exclamation mark! Even ‘password9!’ is considerably more secure than just ‘password’.

Click on the graphic for an expanded view.