This year the annual research covers 50 different countries, the top passwords among different genders, as well as a global view
According to the 2021 research by NordPass, the most popular password in Canada is 123456,. Moreover, it is the top password in 43 countries out of the 50 analyzed, and is also the most popular worldwide.
These are the top 20 most common passwords in Canada:
- 123456
- password
- 123456789
- 12345
- 12345678
- qwerty
- abc123
- tiffany
- password1
- testing
- hockey
- 1234567
- iloveyou
- 1234
- canada
- 1234567890
- 111111
- sunshine
- 123123
- dragon
This year, NordPass published research features not only the top 200 passwords globally, but also covers the top 200 passwords of 50 different countries. Furthermore, readers can also explore the most common passwords among different genders in all the researched countries.
Here is the full research: https://nordpass.com/most-common-passwords-list/
Canada is at a high risk of cyber crime
Researchers have also devised a risk index, which sorts countries into three risk tiers: low, average, and high. The index has been devised according to the number of passwords leaked per capita.
According to this research, Canada is the 8th country on the list — one of the highest volumes of passwords leaked per capita (3.608).
Trends and differences among countries and genders
Overall, Canada’s password list has similar trends to many other countries.
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- Easy number combinations, such as the winning “123456”, are popular everywhere in the world. In fact, “123456” was the most popular password in 43 countries out of the 50 analyzed. The top passwords in the remaining seven countries were not that different: in India, the top password was the word “password”, Indonesia — “12345”, Japan — “password”, Portugal — “12345”, Spain — “12345”, Thailand — “12345”, Ukraine — “qwerty”.
- “Qwerty” and the variations of it or the localized versions of qwerty (for example, “azerty” in French speaking countries) are also popular in all the analyzed countries, including Canada.
- People use loving words everywhere, such as “iloveyou” and its localized versions (“ichliebedich”, “tequiero” and so on). In Canada, women seem to use such words more often, for example, passwords “iloveyou”, “princess”, and “sunshine” are in the female top 10.
- This research also shows that people tend to use their own names as their passwords, as female names mostly dominate the women’s lists, and male ones dominate men’s. However, among Canadian females, the top name is “charlie” which could be both masculine or feminine, among men, the most popular name is “michael”.
- Sports play an important part in the top password list worldwide. In Canada, “hockey” is the most popular one among sports, followed by “soccer”, “baseball”, and “basketball”,.
- Canadians are pretty patriotic. Canada has perhaps the largest number of country-related passwords, such as “toronto”, “montreal”, “canada”, “canada1”.
Weak passwords — a global problem
The NordPass research also illustrates how weak the top passwords are by indicating the time it would take a hacker to crack that password. While the “Time to crack” measure is indicative and depends on various technological aspects, it’s a good reference point that shows how poor these passwords are. Overall, in Canada, 144 passwords out of the 200 can be cracked in less than a second. That’s 72%, whereas globally, the percentage is 84.5%.
“Unfortunately, passwords keep getting weaker and people still don’t maintain proper password hygiene,” says Jonas Karklys, CEO of NordPass. “It’s important to understand that passwords are the gateway to our digital lives, and with us spending more and more time online, it’s becoming enormously important to take better care of our cybersecurity.”
Found your password on the “most popular” list?
Jonas Karklys, CEO of NordPass advises taking a few simple steps in order to improve your password hygiene.
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- If you found your password on the list, make sure to change it to a unique and strong one. Ideally, use a password generator online or in your password manager app to create a truly complex password.
- Store your passwords in a password manager. Nowadays, an average person has around 100 accounts, so it would be impossible to remember all the passwords if they are indeed unique and complex. Password managers are a great solution for that, but make sure to use a trustworthy, reliable, and, ideally, third-party audited provider.
- Use multi-factor authentication. Whether it’s biometric authentication, a phone message, or physical key, it’s always a good idea to add an additional extra security layer on top of your password.
Methodology: The list of passwords was compiled in partnership with independent researchers specializing in research of cybersecurity incidents. They evaluated a 4TB-sized database.
Researchers classified the data into various verticals, which allowed them to perform a statistical analysis based on countries and gender.
With regard to the gender vertical, the researched data was classified by gender only if it included a gender key. If the breached data didn’t contain the data key, it was classified as “unknown”.
ABOUT NORDPASS
NordPass is a password manager for both business and consumer clients. It’s powered by the latest technology for the utmost security. Developed with affordability, simplicity, and ease-of-use in mind, NordPass allows users to access passwords securely on desktop, mobile, and browsers. All passwords are encrypted on the device, so only the user can access them. NordPass was created by the experts behind NordVPN — the advanced security and privacy app trusted by more than 14 million customers worldwide. For more information: nordpass.com.