More than 50 Percent of Users Got Hacked in the Last 12 Months - Study

[Exterminator]

A recent research conducted by TeleSign in the United States and involving 1,300 adults reveals that no less than 51 percent of consumers suffered some kind of security incident in the last 12 months, including here a stolen password or a personal account breached by hackers.

The survey reveals that no less than 31 percent of the consumers believe that their online life is worth $100,000 or even more (some even said priceless), and this is one of the reasons they are targeted by hackers.

“The value of online life increases with age. Online accounts and their associated assets are valued at $100,000 or more by only 16% of Millennials, almost doubling to 30% of GenXers, then jumping to 46% of Baby Boomers and 50% of Silent Generation consumers,” the study shows.

Same password on multiple websites
What’s a bit more worrying is that 71 percent of the respondents admitted to using the same password on more than one website and this increases the risk of breaches for their accounts. Recently, it was reported that the UK National Lottery was hacked after cybercriminals discovered a password that was reused on other websites and managed to infiltrate into the main servers.

“The average number of accounts protected by the same password is nine accounts for Millennials, six for all other generations combined and seven for all respondents,” TeleSign says.

Most consumers have less than 5 passwords to protect all their accounts, and half of them haven’t even changed their password in the last five years or longer.

On the good side, use of two-factor authentication has increased between 2015 and 2016 by 18 percent, and now 46 percent of the consumers are using it.

In case you’re wondering why users do not configure two-factor authentication for their accounts, 35 percent of the consumers didn’t even know this feature existed, while 27 percent of the respondents said they don’t know what this actually is. 23 percent said they don’t know how to turn it on.

 

[_CyberGhosT_]

Cool Share Exterminator.
something about softpedia articles that
sticks in my craw.

 

[Svoll]

That article almost described me, using same passwords on multiple sites and email. 3 passwords I used and switched constantly. After joining MT, i have changed my ways. I now have one masterpassword (20 characters long with special keys, numbers, etc) and used a password manager to generate keys for different site and email password. Its quite convenient now, but I am concern about relying too much on password managers now. So I did something silly, I used 2 passwords manager, one for cloud storage (lastpass) that i am able to access on any device and 1 for my local machine (Sticky Password) and Word document with all my passwords for offline storage.

Paranoid

 

[Axelrod Sven]

2-Factor authentication is a definite must have. I think that most VIP's are hacked because they don't have 2-Factor authentication - which sets a bad precedent, because they anyway have weak passwords. Maybe because for government officials/offices, a long/tough password is impractical, and so is Google authenticator. But they really should implement 2-Factor, and raise awareness. Look at the poll, see how many people aren't aware! Send people e-mails, show a few ads about it, share articles...spread the word...though it's not enough, is it...

 

[jamescv7]

Many [not all] users are still irresponsible on security matters, even though you have same passwords on multiple accounts however care to have strong password combination.

Another thing where some fall on classic and not so clever phishing sites without looking from the URL.