Password security concerns aired

Around 1.7 million Britons could be at risk of internet fraud and cybercriminals by using the same password for every website they use that requires them to log in.

Research from insurance firm CPP revealed 54 per cent of the British public use slight variations of a password for different sites.

Around half of those questioned use the same password for each login, with most of them being easily guessable words such as pet names, children?s names, and birthdays.

The statistics are particularly worrying as instances of fraudsters accessing individuals? accounts to steal bank details are on the increase - therefore having an strong password using numbers as well as letters is becoming incredibly important to prevent fraud.

How to: Protect your passwords

The research also found a staggering 40 per cent of British adults have revealed their password to at least one other person, making them even more vulnerable to fraud.

However security firm SecurEnvoy said that passwords would always be insecure as long as they "are managed by humans not machines".

"To stay secure we should be going beyond the password and using an additional layer of security to access the information we need in life and at work," said SecurEnvoy's co-founder Steve Watts.

"We all know that we should use complex passwords that differ every time, but how on earth would we remember them? The answer is, we wouldn't. In fact, we'd probably end up writing them all down somewhere and increasing the security risk even further," Watts said.