Home Security Heroes, a group of internet security specialists, discovered that Artificial Intelligence (AI) can hack more than 50% of commonly used passwords in under a minute. The research focuses on PassGAN, an AI password breaker.
According to the study, the AI can hack over 66% of passwords in less than an hour and 81% in less than 30 days.
But, AI can only guess easy-to-predict and generic passwords in under a minute. Little passwords with short character lengths are easily guessable by AI. Using your name or date of birth as a password, for example, makes it generic and easy to guess.
Ways to protect from password-cracking AIs
To keep track of your passwords across many accounts, use a password manager.
These are a few steps to take to protect your passwords against an AI hack:
- Use passwords with at least 17 random characters, including upper and lowercase letters, numbers, and symbols.
- Don’t reuse the same password for different accounts. Use a password manager to manage your login credentials.
- Use a two-factor authentication (2FA) app, change your passwords every 90 days, and avoid using public Wi-Fi.