During the pandemic era we have seen cybersecurity come into even sharper focus as those working from home have become prime targets for criminals. One would think that this would inspire people to use better passwords, but the 2021 list of most commonly used passwords by NordPass says otherwise.
This as 123456 is the most commonly used password both in South Africa and across the globe.
For South Africa, the second most used password is “password” and the third most is 12345, pointing to serious lack of originality or care in terms of what passwords we use to safeguard what we access online.
Perhaps this laxness is driven by the fact that SA suffers relatively low password leaks per capita compared to the other 49 countries that NordPass surveyed while coming up with this 2021 list.
SA recoded a little over 22 million password leaks, which is rather small when compared to the United States at over 1.69 billion leaks.
Either way, this list highlights the fact that if you choose to opt for a simple password, and one as basic as 123456, you’ll likely suffer issues down the line.
Whether that it for personal or business-related accounts remains to be seen, but as hybrid and remote working continue across the globe, better passwords are a must.
You can view the list for SA, as well as the aforementioned 49 other countries at NordPass’ site here, along with seeing what services the password protection platform has.
