Last week's theft of 6.5 million LinkedIn user passwords not only once again demonstrated the threat the hacking community poses in acquiring our personal data; but it also highlights the sheer ignorance and stupidity of millions of people on the internet who are not taking necessary precaution in protecting themselves on the web.

As more and more of our lives are broadcast on the internet and everything from our bank statements, credit card details, personal information, contact details are now stored in the cloud, you'd have thought there would be a greater intelligence out there to take more care in creating a safe, secure, yet memorable password. If the LinkedIn hack is anything to go by, that notion seems to evade most people. Created by cyber security firm Rapid7, the below infographic shows the astounding apathy to protection online and lists some of the most popular passwords accessed in the hack; a what's not to do when coming up with a sequence of letters used to protect your online identity. And no, '1234', 'god' and 'sex' does not constitute a good password.

Source: Rapid7

Richard Birkett