Top password of 2014: ‘password’

People choose bad passwords. That’s no surprise.

But SplashData’s annual list of the top 25 passwords reveals that we’re not getting any better.

{mosads}The top two passwords in 2014 — ”123456” and “password” — remain unchanged since 2011, when SplashData first put the list together. The leaders are followed closely by “12345,” “12345678” and “qwerty.”

SplashData, a password management firm, compiled its list from 3.3 million passwords leaked during data breaches in 2014.

Although the most common passwords are fairly predictable, others are either telling of America’s interests — ”baseball” and “football” made the top 10 — or simply perplexing — “dragon” was the ninth-most popular password.

Some notable newcomers to the list include “696969” and “batman.” The Caped Crusader joined his Justice League colleague “superman,” who was already on the password list.

Among the more humorous passwords on the list: “letmein” and “trustno1”.

Fallible passwords are frequently cited as the biggest cybersecurity concern for companies and government agencies. Hacking just one employee’s password can give digital invaders access to an entire computer network.

Some suspected a hacked password was responsible for the compromise last week of the U.S. Central Command’s Twitter and YouTube accounts.

Mark Burnett, one of the researchers who worked on the list, told Re/code that there was a silver lining in the findings.

“In 2014, the top 25 passwords represented about 2.2 percent of passwords exposed,” he said. “While still frightening, that’s the lowest percentage of people using the most common passwords I have seen in recent studies.”