00000000: How strong is this password? Not very. What did it protect? Nuclear missiles. There was a time when cracking passwords wasn’t as easy as it is today. During the Cold War, the United States’ Minuteman nuclear missiles required launch codes. Possibly the weakest ever password for the strongest weapon!
Open Sesame: As children we have all read Ali Baba and the 40 Thieves and we’ve all wanted to use this phrase to open doors. Unfortunately, we aren’t in Arabian Nights. In real life, instead of gaining access to a cave with treasure in it, many people gain access to their email and other accounts with this password. Here’s a tip, 0p3nS3s@m3 is a stronger password!
Chuck Norris: “Google won't search for Chuck Norris because it knows you don't find Chuck Norris, he finds you.” This is what happens when you search ‘Where is Chuck Norris’ on Google. The man’s a legend and so is the password. Interestingly, in 2010, an engineer from Facebook had said that at one time users could login to any Facebook account using a master password. This password was a Chuck Norris, but it replaced some letters with symbols. See what they did there?
Swordfish: Remember the Marx brothers film Horse Feathers? If you do, you would remember the password Professor Wagstaff used to gain access to speakeasy. This password and spoofs of it have since then been seen in Scooby Doo, FETCH! With Ruff Ruffman, Harry Potter, Mad Men and even Star Trek and of course the movie Swordfish.
Buddy: Ex-US President Bill Clinton used this password to sign the Electronic Signatures in Global and National Commerce (E-SIGN) Act in 2000. The Act made electronic contracts and signatures legal in foreign and interstate commerce. Clinton used a smart card to sign the Act. This smart card had an encrypted key, which was Buddy, after his pet dog. The password became even less secure when Clinton decided to share it publicly at the signing in Philadelphia.
Joshua: This one is again from a movie. This time the 1983 film WarGames. David Lightman hacks into a computer gaming company using the backdoor password, which was Joshua. Only, it turns out that he had hacked into NORAD’s (North American Aerospace Defence Command) War Operation Plan Response computer. Fictional, but it made the password famous.
Tiger: Oracle database users would relate to this password. If you’ve worked extensively on the database, chances are that you’ve come across the famous Scott schema, which is accessed using this password. This schema consists of some tables that illustrate the basic concepts of the database.
IAcceptTheRisk: The Xerox Star 8010 workstation, which was released in 1981 and introduced concepts like a graphical user interface, clickable icons etc. This computer also needed a password in order to access certain admin functions. This password was IAcceptTheRisk. It had to be used along with the code 911.
Z1ON0101: In Matrix Reloaded, the character Trinity, uses the Nmap tool to hack into a computer system by exploiting a real SSH vulnerability. She resets the password of the system to Z1ON0101 in order to gain control of it. It is a variation of the name Zion, the last human city left on Earth in Matrix. While only hackers got the accuracy depicted in the scene, the rest of the world remembered the password.
12345: We have all seen this password at least once in our life. Interestingly, it is the password that Syrian president Bashar al-Assad used for his email account. It was revealed in 2012, when Anonymous hacked into the account. It was also the password for the planet Druidia’s air shield in the classic comedy Spaceballs.
Sher: It’s been only two years since this one started doing the rounds, but it is just as famous as the others now. In the first episode of the second season of BBC series Sherlock, this is the code Irene Adler uses in order to protect a phone containing sensitive documents that she used to blackmail the British government. The code made the lock screen of the device spell, “I AM SHER LOCKED”.
Open Sesame: As children we have all read Ali Baba and the 40 Thieves and we’ve all wanted to use this phrase to open doors. Unfortunately, we aren’t in Arabian Nights. In real life, instead of gaining access to a cave with treasure in it, many people gain access to their email and other accounts with this password. Here’s a tip, 0p3nS3s@m3 is a stronger password!
Chuck Norris: “Google won't search for Chuck Norris because it knows you don't find Chuck Norris, he finds you.” This is what happens when you search ‘Where is Chuck Norris’ on Google. The man’s a legend and so is the password. Interestingly, in 2010, an engineer from Facebook had said that at one time users could login to any Facebook account using a master password. This password was a Chuck Norris, but it replaced some letters with symbols. See what they did there?
Swordfish: Remember the Marx brothers film Horse Feathers? If you do, you would remember the password Professor Wagstaff used to gain access to speakeasy. This password and spoofs of it have since then been seen in Scooby Doo, FETCH! With Ruff Ruffman, Harry Potter, Mad Men and even Star Trek and of course the movie Swordfish.
Buddy: Ex-US President Bill Clinton used this password to sign the Electronic Signatures in Global and National Commerce (E-SIGN) Act in 2000. The Act made electronic contracts and signatures legal in foreign and interstate commerce. Clinton used a smart card to sign the Act. This smart card had an encrypted key, which was Buddy, after his pet dog. The password became even less secure when Clinton decided to share it publicly at the signing in Philadelphia.
Joshua: This one is again from a movie. This time the 1983 film WarGames. David Lightman hacks into a computer gaming company using the backdoor password, which was Joshua. Only, it turns out that he had hacked into NORAD’s (North American Aerospace Defence Command) War Operation Plan Response computer. Fictional, but it made the password famous.
Tiger: Oracle database users would relate to this password. If you’ve worked extensively on the database, chances are that you’ve come across the famous Scott schema, which is accessed using this password. This schema consists of some tables that illustrate the basic concepts of the database.
IAcceptTheRisk: The Xerox Star 8010 workstation, which was released in 1981 and introduced concepts like a graphical user interface, clickable icons etc. This computer also needed a password in order to access certain admin functions. This password was IAcceptTheRisk. It had to be used along with the code 911.
Z1ON0101: In Matrix Reloaded, the character Trinity, uses the Nmap tool to hack into a computer system by exploiting a real SSH vulnerability. She resets the password of the system to Z1ON0101 in order to gain control of it. It is a variation of the name Zion, the last human city left on Earth in Matrix. While only hackers got the accuracy depicted in the scene, the rest of the world remembered the password.
12345: We have all seen this password at least once in our life. Interestingly, it is the password that Syrian president Bashar al-Assad used for his email account. It was revealed in 2012, when Anonymous hacked into the account. It was also the password for the planet Druidia’s air shield in the classic comedy Spaceballs.
Sher: It’s been only two years since this one started doing the rounds, but it is just as famous as the others now. In the first episode of the second season of BBC series Sherlock, this is the code Irene Adler uses in order to protect a phone containing sensitive documents that she used to blackmail the British government. The code made the lock screen of the device spell, “I AM SHER LOCKED”.
