SpartanTec, Inc. Wilmington: Survey Shows Bad Password Security Habits Still Linger

Tuesday, March 5, 2019

Survey Shows Bad Password Security Habits Still Linger

Password security has been a major concern stressed out by industry experts. For years, experts have warned about the bad habits people have when it comes to their passwords. It’s been a known fact that the weakest link in information security is bad employee password habits. Having weak passwords make systems vulnerable. Regardless of how strong the defenses of a system may be, weak passwords become a loophole that a lot of hackers take advantage of. There have been seminars held to highlight the perils of using one password across different websites.

Quite a number of training were setup to push the idea of eliminating old bad password habits.

How did it fair? Not so good. Google had recently conducted a survey and showed concerning results. Two thirds of the survey respondents said that they still had the same bad password habits even after campaigns have been made to highlight the securitythreats. The problem remains.

And it doesn’t stop there. Things continue to go downhill. Around 69% of the survey respondents said that they would rate their ability to protect themselves online an A or a B. Meanwhile, 59% said that their skill were beyond that of an average person when it comes to protecting accounts online.

The survey also highlighted other results. Here they are:

· Less than 25% of the respondents said that they were using an application or service that would manage their passwords for them.

· Only around 70% said that they frequently update their operating systems and applications, despite the fact that 80% claimed to have understood the importance of regular updates.

· As for familiarity with the terms 2FA, phishing, and password manager, only 32% of survey respondents said they were able to identify all key terms.

With the results in mind, it’s clear to see that there remains a huge chunk of the population that needs constant persuasion in terms of ridding themselves of their bad password habits. And before things change for the better, there’s nothing preventing hackers worldwide to have a go at vulnerable systems. IT professionals Wilmington has lot of work to do. It’s safe to say that there will be more data breaches this year.