Over the weekend, I updated a couple of the multitude of accounts I have. Bank PINS, three different email passwords, credit card logins, facebook logins, twitter logins, the cable bill passwords, the electric bill account information.
Am I a slave to data? Sometimes it feels that way, but I know at least my data is reasonably safe because of it.
Here's how I know its partially safe.
Sorry to ruin your afternoon, but that PIN number you picked—probably a birthday, month/day combo, or year in the 1900s—is among the easiest for thieves to guess. And if you chose "1234," "1111," or "0000," consider your bank account a slush fund for anyone who steals your card. The firm Data Genetics looked through a database of stolen passwords—mostly for websites—and ranked the popularity of PIN codes, Slate reports. A few tidbits:
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The least popular PIN is 8068, used in less than 0.001% of passwords. But with that information now public, it may not be the best choice.
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The next four least-chosen numbers are "8093," "9629," "6835," and "7637."
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People tend to like using odd numbers rather than even.
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22nd-most popular is "2580." You can figure out why by looking at your phone keypad and seeing which numbers run down the middle.
Now go update that PIN.
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