A survey of 1,685 US businesses has shown that nearly a quarter of workers
have to remember 15 or more passwords.
The researchers claim that this is costing money because of the level of
support calls and the length of time it takes to get passwords reset.
Nearly one in five of those questioned had to wait an hour or more before
regaining access to their systems.
Many users are writing down their passwords to deal with the problem,
which can lead to a serious breach of security.
A quarter of users store them on a spreadsheet on their PC, 23 per cent on a
PDA, 15 per cent keep a paper record and nearly one in 20 attach their password
to the PC with a Post-it note.
"Compliance initiatives have led companies to enforce and strengthen password
policies, which has resulted in additional burdens for the end user, such as
requiring that employees change passwords more frequently, or use passwords that
are very difficult to remember," said Andrew Braunberg, senior analyst at
Current Analysis.
"Paradoxically, password policies that are not user-friendly spur risky
behaviour that can undermine security. These policies also raise IT help desk
costs as companies allocate more resources to password resets."
The survey, sponsored by
RSA Security, found
that 88 per cent of respondents are frustrated at their company's password
policy.
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