A Third of Americans Use Easy-to-Guess Pet Passwords

For all who celebrate World Password Day, here’s an easy way to immediately boost online safety — stop picking your pets’ names for passwords.

An overwhelming number of Americans (39%) use their pet’s name as part of their password, according to new data from Aura. That number jumps to half (50%) for pet lovers between the ages of 35 to 44, Aura added.

“Through this campaign, Aura aims to highlight … that while using a pet’s name as a password may be a show of love and an easy-to-remember access code to your online life, pet passwords are some of the easiest for cybercriminals to guess,” the company said in a statement.

Other notable findings from the survey found 59% of pet parents have posted a picture of their pet on a social-media account, and 48% have also shared their pet’s name, giving attackers a good place to start guessing online account passwords, Aura pointed out.

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