# Anonymous Hacks Syrian President; His Password Was 12345 **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [February 9, 2012, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-hacks-syrian-president-his-password-was-12345/612265 "2012-02-09T02:29:46Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![davidm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/davidm/32/225_2.png) [@davidm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidm)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2012, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-hacks-syrian-president-his-password-was-12345/612265/1 "2012-02-09T02:29:46Z")
> **[Anonymous Hacks Syrian President; His Password Was 12345](https://www.tomshardware.com/news/Anonymous-Syrian-president-email-password-leaked-hacked,14663.html)** > > Time to change everyone's password to 54321. > [@](#): > > After all, it can’t have taken much hacking prowess to access an account protected with the world’s second weakest password: 12345. To make matters worse, Anonymous was also able to access 78 accounts belonging to al-Assad’s staff, with 33 of them using the same 12345 or 123456 passwords. Part of my job is to create email account for new employees. This story is a good example of why I give them randomly generated strings of letters and numbers for passwords. People have actually asked me to give them passwords like pass456 and I won’t do it. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2012, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-hacks-syrian-president-his-password-was-12345/612265/2 "2012-02-09T02:36:15Z")
Probably had it on his luggage, too. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2012, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-hacks-syrian-president-his-password-was-12345/612265/3 "2012-02-09T02:39:17Z")
> [@Lute Skywatcher](#): > > Probably had it on his luggage, too. First thing I thought of. What a Spaceball! ---
**Author:** ![davidm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/davidm/32/225_2.png) [@davidm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidm)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2012, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-hacks-syrian-president-his-password-was-12345/612265/4 "2012-02-09T02:42:19Z")
With a password like that, I have to wonder if a number of other governments weren’t already reading his email on a regular basis. ---
**Author:** ![Gorsnak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gorsnak/32/7587_2.png) [@Gorsnak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gorsnak)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2012, 2:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-hacks-syrian-president-his-password-was-12345/612265/5 "2012-02-09T02:49:04Z")
> [@davidm](#): > > With a password like that, I have to wonder if a number of other governments weren’t already reading his email on a regular basis. Heh. All of whom are now pissed off at Anonymous for spoiling their access. ---
**Author:** ![Covered\_In\_Bees](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/7ab992/32.png) [@Covered\_In\_Bees](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Covered_In_Bees)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2012, 3:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anonymous-hacks-syrian-president-his-password-was-12345/612265/6 "2012-02-09T03:10:28Z")
People are stupid.