Advertisement

Swedes 'not safe enough' online: report

The Local Sweden
The Local Sweden - [email protected]
Swedes 'not safe enough' online: report

As Swedes use more and more password protected internet sites, a new report shows that average Swedish web-surfers uses too few passwords to keep themselves safe from hackers.

Advertisement

The report, produced by security firm Kaspersky Lab, pointed out that almost 50 percent of the people surveyed admitted to using between three and five passwords, wrote the Svenska Dagbladet (SvD) newspaper.

While David Jacoby, the researcher behind the report, points out that it’s important to use a variety of passwords, he explained that many people use the same password for their email and Facebook accounts.

Multiple passwords work as an increased protection against hackers and online criminals, according to Jacoby.

Despite one in three Swedes using more than ten websites which need passwords, the report shows that only 10 percent of Swedes use unique passwords for each site.

Web-surfers aged 56-70 actually turned out to be the safest of those interviewed, with one third of them claiming to use unique passwords for each password protected site they visit.

Meanwhile, only one in six people from the rest of the field can make the same claim.

Jacoby suggests internet users to change passwords periodically, to use different passwords for different sites, and to include the Swedish ö, ä, and å letters to evade foreign hackers who may not have access to the symbols, wrote the paper.

According to a the 2012 Global Security Report from Trustwave, the most commonly used password in the world is “Password1”.

TT/The Local/og

twitter.com/thelocalsweden

More

Join the conversation in our comments section below. Share your own views and experience and if you have a question or suggestion for our journalists then email us at [email protected].
Please keep comments civil, constructive and on topic – and make sure to read our terms of use before getting involved.

Please log in to leave a comment.

See Also