About 2 out of 3 Indonesians have experienced a personal data leak. This is concluded in a recent survey by Google with the research institute YouGov regarding the habits of people keeping their passwords on the internet. Google Indonesia’s Product Marketing Manager, Amanda Chan, said that personal data leaks are usually triggered by weak password combinations. In fact, about 89 percent of Indonesians surveyed by Google and YouGov admitted that they made passwords that were categorized as weak and easy to guess.
Some passwords that are easy to guess include using important dates such as birthdays, names of girlfriends or partners, pet names, and postal codes as their passwords. Users who create passwords without a combination of numbers and symbols, for example only letters or numbers, are also considered weak passwords, as well as those who do not use a combination of capital letters. “When we sacrifice security for convenience by creating easy-to-guess passwords, we make our personal information highly insecure.”
The habit of using weak passwords themselves, continued Amanda, is usually caused by the difficulty of a user remembering passwords. So, they use simple password combinations that are easy to remember. “As many as 40 percent of our respondents (in Indonesia) admit that they are afraid of forgetting the new password, and 30 percent use the same password because it is more practical,”
What happens when there is a data leak?
The majority of users who use passwords that are classified as weak will be motivated to keep their passwords safe, if it turns out that they are victims of data leaks.
This is reflected in 80 percent of Google and YouGov respondents who said that they would change their passwords if there was a possibility that their personal data had been stolen. Meanwhile, 67 percent of respondents also said that they are likely to use security features such as two-factor authentication (2FA) to secure their accounts, although it is not required. Then, the majority of respondents also said they would use a tool such as a password manager to create secure passwords. However, that statement was just an intention. Due to the fact, continued Amanda, only a few of the respondents have used these security tools.
“2 out of 3 people said they would likely start using a password manager service, but 95 percent of respondents still haven’t used the tool,” concluded Amanda. For your information, the survey conducted by Google with YouGov was conducted on about 13,870 internet users in 11 countries in the Asia Pacific region, including Indonesia, aged 18 years and over.
This research was conducted in September 2021 and was only released in early November and Google did not reveal how many respondents were from Indonesia.
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