Cybercriminals can crack weak passwords in less than 2 seconds

A study by Mantis, a national digital risk protection platform from ISH Tech, Brazil’s largest cybersecurity firm, revealed that weak passwords, up to 11 characters long and containing only numbers, can be instantly cracked by criminals. computer scientists using the brute force method (trial and error).

This research also claims that all credentials less than 6 characters, including letters, can be stolen in less than 2 seconds.

Leonardo Camata, Mantis Director of Operations, said: “Given that information security is the most critical and targeted pillar of organizations, the awareness of the need to protect our data cannot be overstated. One of the ways to achieve this is with stronger passwords, which unfortunately is not yet a reality in Brazil. ”

It is important to remember that a recently published ranking shows that “123456” is the most used password, not only among Brazilians, but all over the world.

By comparison, in a hypothetical scenario, it would take about 3,000 years to crack a password of 12 characters or more with upper and lower case letters, numbers and special characters.

Take a look at the table below, which shows that the more complex the password, the harder it will be to recover it:

The survey also highlights what tactics hackers use to gain access to credentials. In addition to the use of hacking, social engineering techniques, such as fake emails and malicious links, are common.

There is also the voice phishing warning, in which the attacker, in contact with the victim, pretends to be the technical team of your company in an attempt to trick you into giving out your password.

How to create a secure password

In addition to creating non-obvious passwords and avoiding public data about the user (such as date of birth, names of relatives), Camata reinforces the need not to reuse them. “No matter how strong the password is, in this case it is sufficient for the attacker to discover it once to gain access to the most varied systems.”

Furthermore, the suggestion is to create passwords of at least eight characters, combining upper and lower case letters, numbers and keyboard symbols.

Another solution that can help users, Camata offers password storage tools available on the web, including Google. These apps also have cool features, such as alerting you if passwords are weak, reused, or previously leaked.

But remember that strong passwords are only half the job. “It is extremely important that the company has a well-defined data protection culture, regularly changing credentials and promoting educational campaigns on the extent of the danger that exists on the other side of the screen,” concludes the executive.

The post Cybercriminals Can Decrypt Weak Passwords in Under 2 Seconds first appeared on Digital Look.

Source: Olhar Digital