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Elderly Use More Secure Passwords Than Millennials, Says Report (qz.com)
An anonymous reader writes from a report via Quartz: A report released May 24 by Gigya surveyed 4,000 adults in the U.S. and U.K. and found that 18- to 34-year-olds are more likely to use bad passwords and report their online accounts being compromised. The majority of respondents ages 51 to 69 say they completely steer away from easily cracked passwords like "password," "1234," or birthdays, while two-thirds of those in the 18-to-34 age bracket were caught using those kind of terms. Quartz writes, "The diligence of the older group could help explain why 82% of respondents in this age range did not report having had any of their online accounts compromised in the past year. In contrast, 35% of respondents between 18 and 34 said at least one of their accounts was hacked within the last 12 months, twice the rate of those aged 51 to 69."
Damn.
51-69 is elderly???? Come on who wrote this.... 75 maybe, 80 even. But 50-60 is not.
I strongly suspect that 'millennials' have password protected accounts at far more places online than 51+ people. At that point it doesn't matter how strong your password is, but which shitty service stores your password as unsalted MD5 and lets the intern leave the remote login session active
The sixty-year old guy's password: "NowIsTheWinterOfOurDiscontent"
The thirty-year-old guy's password: "trumpsucks" ("trumpsucksbigtime" if you're lucky).
Ezekiel 23:20
The older group are probably more likely to have their passwords written down on sticky notes under their keyboards, or stuck to their monitors.
Furthermore, the percent of hacked accounts would be hard to solve, as many younger folk are likely signed up to way more sites and services using the same password across the board. This would easier intrusion into the more secured sites.
There is so much wrong with that as to be comical.
When do you ever hear about insecure passwords being compromised? That doesn't happen. They get leaked. Constantly. But not guessed, not when they can be leaked or stolen.
So how does a super-ultra-secure password help?
And then we have this odd bit of math, that 18% of the >51 age range had compromised accounts, while less than double that, 35%, of the youngest range had. Probably, but unclear because the report requires providing PII, while having four times more accounts. I'd certainly bet that the 18-to-34 age bracket has more than double the account count of the compu-geysers. (I say as someone just squeaking below that bar.)
Which would imply that, mathematically, insecure passwords are more secure. Go figure.
Millenials are the worst!
Also, women, foreigners, minorities, point-haired bosses, liberal arts majors, and really anybody who isn't an old white man with an interest in science/math! They're all the worst!
Slashdot: providing anti-social weirdos a soapbox, since 1997.
Because they have them written on a piece of tape across the top of the monitor.
And ? Who's going to know unless you force your way into their home ?
Using a complicated to crack password and writing on a piece of paper sticked to the monitor is 100 times more useful than using a password you can crack in 2 minutes even if you keep it only in your head.
Of course if you do such a thing at work in an open space environment well that's stupid.
I'm nearly 60, s'pose that makes me nearly elderly.
I pick my passwords using
pwgen -y
and select from a screen full of 'memorable' passwords
Go well
...old people are on average more responsible than young people! Groundbreaking research!
I ignore Anonymous Coward posts. If you want to discuss something, that's awesome. Log in.
Anything that is financially sensitive or has access to lots of personal correspondence will require a very secure password. My email password is 26 characters. My social media one is 16. My bank password is less "secure" because they don't accept quite a few characters that Google/MS/FB accept, but it's still not something anyone is gonna spend any time cracking.
Then we get to sites like my newspaper subscription or my intramural sports login. Those are just simple dictionary words I've used since I was 12. I don't give a shit if someone hacks into those accounts. By all means log in and view my mediocre playoff record.
As we reuse the one password that is not easy to guess, but we can remember and use since 45 years (and we know it never got "cracked").
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
...we know more words.
My password "cheat sheet" purposely has typos in them, and don't explicitly say what they go to.
.docx file, not printed on paper.)
My memory is good enough to know them by heart most of the time, but for some seldom used ones, just looking at my notes is enough to remind ME. I wouldn't want to have someone take my crib notes, but the casual burglar isn't likely to be sober long enough or be patient enough to try and figure out my mess-o-letters.
(oh, and it is in an encrypted
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
I'm elderly and my password is so strong that I forget it in 2009 and haven't been able to log in to anything since.
You are welcome on my lawn.
>"Elderly Use More Secure Passwords Than Millennials[...]The majority of respondents ages 51 to 69 say they completely steer away from easily cracked passwords"
Under what/whose definition is a 51-year-old "elderly"??? Was this title written by a 20-year-old or something? Even 60 is hardly "elderly". And why are there only two groups- 18-34 and 51-69? They are not equal spans? What happened to 35-50?
Yeesh
Chrono-Americans use better passwords because unlike the young, they write everything down. A user who never takes her laptop to Starbucks or to work is okay with setting up difficult passwords and then referring to a list in the silverware drawer when her grandchildren need to connect to the WiFi.
Using a complicated to crack password and writing on a piece of paper sticked to the monitor is 100 times more useful than using a password you can crack in 2 minutes even if you keep it only in your head.
Of course if you do such a thing at work in an open space environment well that's stupid.
That's why I use ROT13, twice.
"The diligence of the older group could help explain why 82% of respondents in this age range did not report having had any of their online accounts compromised in the past year"
Did not report or have still not noticed ??
I joke...
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
Older folks have a bigger stash and also don't have time to start over, saving money. It is logical that they are more eager to protect what they have than a generation that not only has much less but also has time to recover from a loss. Older folks need more protection.
So, as a 57 yr old, I've noticed that people tend to get more jaded as they age. We've been through some shit, and don't want it to happen again. We're not as trusting of everyone as we were in our twenties and thirties. We've been scammed, or someone close to us has, so we've learned by experience. Learning from other people's mistakes isn't easy for most humans.
Now, get the hell off of my lawn.
Just another day in Paradise
If something goes wrong, mommy and daddy will fix it.
That explains why it was on the news yesterday that 1/3 of millennials are living with their enablers (parents). How the hell are they supposed to learn anything when we're still doing their laundry, making their dinner, and paying their bills?
Just another day in Paradise
This article is stupid. Who says compromised accounts are gained by password guessing? There are many other ways:
Brute force is uncommon these days, because there is technology to limit password guessing.
This white paper requires registration to obtain. The whole thing is a poorly veiled attempt to sell the identity management solution. This isn't news. This is infomercial.
I've seen a lot of very weak passwords from my elderly users, and those that look strong are often guessable with a little research. If you know the names and birth years of their grandchildren, you probably have all you need.
and Ferris Bueller.
Everyone knows long passwords are more secure than short ones.
Slow down, cowboy! It has been 4 hours since you last posted. You must wait another few hours.
You guys make me feel like I am not alone. I have three "millennial" generation children who did NOT get coddled for the first 18 (or 21) years of their lives and I still can't get rid of one of them. Two of them turned out okay but one of them bought into the whole package of unreasonable expectations, entitlement, and absence of accountability.. which I might add if you purchase all three you get a free box of Bernie Sanders bumper stickers, which that kid wallpapered his room with right before we kicked him out of the house.
My youngest just turned 22 and has still not figured out his "life calling," as he puts it. Mom and I just had to cut him off of the free meals because he would come over almost every day unannounced for both lunch AND dinner, so now he's only allowed over for dinner once per week (and don't get me started on the shitstorm he tried giving me for that, or what it took for him to just get out of the house and into his own apartment).
Some day maybe I'll figure out how someone who is 22 years old finds it acceptable that "making a living" is living in a run down apartment with two roommates and working a part time job at a coffee shop (not even Starbucks, because they're a big, evil corporation, man!). The kid has no ambition, no savings, and no plan, despite being encouraged his entire life.
My other kids are a Veterinarian and a Lawyer... not sure what happened to this one.
The "report" is just the outcome of an online poll-- i.e. they asked people if they believed they were creating secure passwords. The only data they're tracking is based on whomever answered their survey, not an actual observation of passwords created by any age group. Honestly, as someone who deals with both targeted groups on a daily basis, I can assure you that I've seen some incredibly bad passwords, and they're typically created by people in the +50 age range.
for much of her stuff. She's super-paranoid about hacking. I've been trying to convince her that she doesn't need such strong passwords for inconsequential websites, for example. Sometimes she has to read something like 7r8guP-a+uN-sUfe over the phone to me when she needs me to login somewhere to take care of something. Hilarity ensues...
I know how we over 50s can have absolutely secure passwords that the younger hackers can't get at! Write them..in CURSIVE...