In just two years, thanks to advances in technology, the time it takes to break an eight-character code – uppercase and lowercase letters, numbers, and special characters – has been significantly shortened, according to a study by cyber security company Hive Systems.
Short and simple codes can be broken in seconds. However, long and complicated ones take a little longer. For some millions of years. This is shown by a recent study by cyber security company Hive Systems from Richmond, Virginia. They researched how long it would take the average hacker to crack the passwords we use to protect our online accounts.
Research has shown that the average hacker can break even an eight-character code – made up of numbers, uppercase, lowercase letters, and special characters – within 39 minutes. Two years ago, it took him eight hours. Any short or less complex code can be easily broken by any hacker who knows what he is doing, even if he uses only basic equipment.
It took five years to break a 10-character code made up of numbers, uppercase, lowercase letters, and special characters two years ago, and five months is enough today.
On the other hand, the average hacker would need 438 billion years to break through an 18-character code that uses a combination of numbers, lowercase, and uppercase letters and symbols, Hive Systems claims.
Research confirms that experts are advised to choose long and complex codes, with at least eight characters, CNBC reports.
