Bad Password Analysis: Consecutive Character Patterns
In this delightfully “bad” foray into password cracking, we tally two‑ and three‑character combos from millions of leaked passwords and compare them to a subtitle‑derived English word list. Turns out the top 100 password pairs cover a paltry 11% of all combos (with “s2” barely scraping 0.15%), while the same slice of English captures a whopping 60%. Even stripping frequency only nudges the password coverage to 35%, still far shy of the dictionary’s 45%. The takeaway? Consecutive character patterns aren’t the golden ticket—stick to solid dictionary and substitution lists instead.