Web Users Prefer Easy-to-Guess Passwords

Despite recommendations by web experts for users to make their log-in passwords more complicated, many people still prefer passwords that are easy to guess, the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday.

According to hackers who managed to extract 188,279 passwords from websites operated by U.S.-based Gawker Media, the most popular password was "123456," followed by "password" and "12345678."

Some of the other top passwords included "lifehack," a reference to Gawker Media website Lifehacker, "qwerty," "abc123" and "111111."

A study in January on 32 million passwords decrypted by another group of hackers also found that the top password was "123456," trailed by "12345," "123456789," "password," and "iloveyou."