Poor ATM PIN codes give the bad guys a 1-in-11 chance at getting your money

Nearly 10 percent of four-digit ATM PIN codes used for banking purposes could be guessed by an opportunistic thief before the card is blocked, according to research carried out by Cambridge University.

In what appears to be the first study of its kind, the researchers say that the widespread usage of dates of birth as PIN codes is primarily to blame for the weakness. The researchers used a combination of leaked data from non-banking sources (specifically 200,000 smartphone unlock-codes and the 1.7 million entries in the RockYou dataset) and an online survey as the data set for the research. In the survey, 1,300 people were asked if their ATM PIN code fell into fell into one of the general categories the team had identified (no, they were’t asked for their PIN codes!).