I guessed someone's password for their email account. What are the statistics of this happening?

Question

I am not proud of it and i have alerted the person in question that I guessed their password so please, no judgments.

I am simply asking a question about probability.

Of course, you can assume that smoenoen may used the name of a loved one or a pet as their password - but this one WAS the name of his pet but it was entered twice (by him)

It took me thirty seconds to guess the password and I almost passed out when I immediately accessed his account.

I want to reiterate that although I accessed his email account there was no malice intended and I have informed him about it.

OK

Here are my issues:

Naturally a pet's name may be an obvious password but how would I know to put the pet's name in twice

Surely I must have had some intuitive thing happen - even if you know the name of someone's pet, is it normal to quickly surmise that he may have put the name in twice as a password?
Is there a way of calculating the probability of my doing that?

Answer 1

well considering that there is an ifinite amount of passwords that one could use, I think that you just got lucky

Answer 2

probability is about 28% of guessing someone's password. actually we use people's passwords on a daily basis, it's just a matter of applying in the right (or wrong)place that will trigger the reaction of obtaining that which you were not intended to obtain.

Answer 3

It depends on the number of characters the password requires...if he needed 10 characters and his dogs name is 'Rover" he may do it twice. BTW I use my pets names also but add in some numbers......... R0V3R

Answer 4

Well if movies have taught us anything, it's easy to figure out anyone's password.

Answer 5

all i know is that the chances of that happening are most likely extremely low.

Answer 6

I'd say you know your friend well. You know his habits and his way of thinking. it's just like that.