A Strong Password Could Take Years To Hack

Password (Getty Images)

(KFOR NEWS March 21, 2022) (CNBC) Short and simple passwords can be cracked in a matter of seconds. Long and complicated ones? Trillions of years.

That’s according to a recent study from Hive Systems, a cybersecurity company based in Richmond, Virginia, which breaks down just how long it would likely take the average hacker to crack the passwords safeguarding your most important online accounts.

The findings suggest that even an eight-character password — with a healthy mix of numbers, uppercase letters, lowercase letters and symbols — can be cracked within eight hours by the average hacker. Anything shorter or less complex could be cracked instantly, or within a few minutes, by any hacker who knows what they’re doing, even if they’re only using fairly basic equipment.

Meanwhile, a password that’s 18 characters in length – and which uses a mix of numbers, lowercase and uppercase letters, and symbols – could take up to 438 trillion years for the average hacker to crack, according to Hive Systems.