IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/aza/csj000/y2021v4i3p223-231.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The human problem behind credential theft and reuse

Author

Listed:
  • Kron, Erich

    (KnowBe4, USA)

Abstract

Credentials are meant to keep accounts and information secure; unfortunately, they are failing to do this on a regular basis. The key reasons for this is not the length or complexity of these credentials, but rather how people are using and protecting them. It has been estimated that within the next few years the average Internet user will have 207 accounts to keep track of. Because the human brain can only remember so many of these long, complex passwords, people have resorted to using them across different accounts. This means a breach at one website may expose credentials to many others. Cybercriminals know how we behave and use this behaviour against their victims. When they are unable to just use credentials from previous breaches, these attackers know that they can easily trick many people out of them by simply using fake login screens to collect them in credential phishing emails. This paper looks at the issues related to password hygiene and credential phishing and ways to mitigate these risks.

Suggested Citation

  • Kron, Erich, 2021. "The human problem behind credential theft and reuse," Cyber Security: A Peer-Reviewed Journal, Henry Stewart Publications, vol. 4(3), pages 223-231, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:aza:csj000:y:2021:v:4:i:3:p:223-231
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://hstalks.com/article/6088/download/
    Download Restriction: Requires a paid subscription for full access.
    File URL: https://hstalks.com/article/6088/
    Download Restriction: Requires a paid subscription for full access.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    credentials; passwords; phishing; reuse; hygiene; multi-factor authentication; training; education;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • M15 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Business Administration - - - IT Management

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:aza:csj000:y:2021:v:4:i:3:p:223-231. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Henry Stewart Talks (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.